


The woods are lovely, dark, and deep

by orphan_account



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: (but it’s an aggressively self aware unhealthy relationship), (off screen), (that’s the best I could do), Codependency, Developing Relationship, Dogs, M/M, Murder, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Relationship Discussions, Road Trips, Talking, Unhealthy Relationships, a little bit of Dark!Will but not really, i mean they’re sitting in a car together for four days, mlm author, so there’s a lot of talking, that’s the fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-24
Updated: 2018-05-31
Packaged: 2019-03-09 01:54:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 31,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13471233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Chiyoh pulled a manila envelope out of the shoulder bag she was wearing. “Passports and driver's licenses for both of you, and the paperwork on a house in British Columbia, in Will's new name.”“So eager to be rid of us?” Hannibal smiled.“Like I said, more trouble than you're worth,” she said, but she was smiling too.Will and Hannibal survive the jump from the cliff, drive across the country, and learn to live with each other





	1. Survival

**Author's Note:**

> I started writing this back in 2015, put it down for two years, and started working on it again only recently. It’s a wip but it’s mostly done and it will definitely have a conclusion soon (I can’t promise to stick to an update schedule but it will be finished). I haven’t been active in the fandom since shortly after season 3 aired but I hope you enjoy this story!
> 
> Rating and tags for later chapters

“We’re supposed to be dead,” Will said, or tried to say. Hannibal felt it more than heard it, a gentle mumbling of lips against the skin of his neck.

They were still in the water, cold stabbing needles into his skin and waves threatening to slam them against sharp rocks. Hannibal clutched Will tighter to his chest and didn’t bother trying to respond. Will would forgive him for saving them, or he wouldn’t. If he saved them. The water around them was stained red with their blood, and Will was already losing consciousness. Hannibal knew he wouldn’t be far behind, and if he succumbed to the sleep tugging at him it was unlikely either of them would wake up.

He kicked hard with his legs, using his free arm to angle them towards the shore. They were not going to drown here in this ocean, he would not submit to the sea, and he would not allow it to take Will from him. He would not lose Will again, not so soon after getting him back—or maybe after getting him for the first time. He could not even conceive of it. He would make it to the shore, because to do otherwise was unthinkable. To lose Will was unthinkable.

Time stretched. His legs kicked, his head pounded, and waves crashed around them. It could have been minutes or hours before he felt earth beneath his hands, but it felt like an eternity. His vision had failed him some time before, and he clawed at the sand, dragging Will’s limp form in the clamp of his embrace. Their legs weren’t even out of the water before the darkness swallowed him.

 

He woke warm and dry, and in significantly less pain. His eyelids felt heavy, and it was tempting to let himself drift back into the soft void of unconsciousness, but he had more than his own life to be concerned about. He managed to get his eyes to open, and then to focus. The room was dark, the only light flickering and dim, and he was not alone.

“Are you back amongst the living?” Chiyoh asked without humor, voice coming from some indiscernible place in the shadows. He couldn’t turn his head enough to see her.

“Will?” he managed, throat aching with even this tiny effort.

He heard her shift, and then her body blocked the light as she offered him a straw. He drank gratefully, waiting for a response and knowing she wouldn’t be rushed. It wasn’t as if he could do much, even if he had wanted to rush her. He was entirely at her mercy.

“He woke up two days ago,” she said. “I had to strap him to the bed to prevent him from getting up to see you. He is healing.”

“How—long?” Hannibal asked her, unable to get out the whole question in one breath.

“Four days,” she told him, setting the cup back down on something and moving out of his line of sight. “I wasn’t sure you were going to make it.”

Hannibal closed his eyes. “Bad?”

“The bullet missed most of your major organs, but you lost a lot of blood, and I am not the doctor you are.” A rustle of cloth, probably a shrug. “The worst is likely over.”

He did his best to nod. It could be much worse. “Where?”

“Somewhere safe, for now. Rest,” she ordered. “I will keep watch.”

It was all too easy to comply.

 

The next time he opened his eyes it was light out, and he could see trees and sky out the window he hadn’t noticed before. He was alone in the room. There was a single set of footsteps moving around below him. Pale walls, hardwood floors, no overhead light on the ceiling. The scent of blood and antiseptic, layered over fir and cedar trees, woodsmoke, kerosene, and propane. A hunting cabin, then, somewhere wooded. Disused. Large enough to have multiple floors, far enough away from the cliff house to be safe. He couldn’t place it, had almost certainly never been here before. So. Chiyoh had her own connections, had found this house on her own. Probably safer than anything of his, although he disliked the uncertainty of that.

Cautiously, carefully analyzing his pain response, he turned on his side, towards where Chiyoh had been when she was there before. There was a small, rustic wood nightstand with a glass of water with a bent straw and a kerosene lamp sitting on it, a wooden rocking chair, and beyond it an open door. The hall had a green rug down the center of it, and the sliver of wall he could see was panelled in a dark wood.

He heard the creak of a bed frame in a neighboring room, and a grunt of pain followed by shuffling footsteps. Even knowing it was coming, it was still a shock to see Will appear in his doorframe, and not because of his injuries, though he looked ragged and ill, dark stitches standing out sharply against pale skin. Will collapsed into the rocking chair and took a few deep breaths before turning to look at Hannibal.

“Hey,” he said, breathlessness and pain evident in his voice alongside surprising warmth.

“Hey,” Hannibal responded, lips pulling into an involuntary smile. They gazed at each other for a time, though it wasn’t awkward. There was a relief to the silence, and a tired kind of affection.

“Chiyoh said you woke up last night, I wanted to see—I wanted to see how you were doing.” Will was still looking at him, the longest they’d ever held eye contact.

“Apparently, I am doing better than expected,” Hannibal said, and then frowned. “She told me she’d strapped you to the bed.”

Will started to smile, and then winced as it pulled the stitching in his cheek. “Well, I may have some experience escaping restraints. I needed to see you,” he blurted, looking down at his hands. “I had to be sure you were alive.”

There was a raw vulnerability to that last sentence that tugged painfully at something in Hannibal’s heart, and he couldn’t stop himself from reaching out towards Will before hastily pulling his hand back. “I rather thought you were hoping for the opposite.”

Will flinched and curled into himself in the chair. “I thought—it seemed easier. To let that be our ending. I don’t—I’m not sure I can do this. I wasn’t. I knew I’d never be strong enough to leave again, and I…” He sighed. “There has always been an electricity, a charge, to the bond between us. It hurts, but.” He looked up, meeting Hannibal’s eyes again. “I can’t get enough of it. I’ve never been able to get enough of you. And I—you’ve done awful things, things I don’t want to be able to understand. You’ve done horrible things _to me_. And yet.” Will shook his head, two sharp shakes, back and forth, eyes on the ground. “I’m the kind of person who rescues every stray dog he finds, Hannibal. All I ever wanted was to help, and you come along and I—how am I supposed to reconcile that, how can you expect me to reconcile _you_ with—that?” He pauses again, for longer this time, one hand scrubbing through his hair before his gaze snaps back to Hannibal’s face. “I want to. I don’t want to want to, but I do. I don’t think I could bear losing you again.”

“When we were in the water, and you lost consciousness, all I could think was ‘I cannot lose him’,” Hannibal said, closing his eyes. “I understand the difficulty this must cause you. And yet the fact remains.”

Cool fingers touched Hannibal’s cheek, and he opened his eyes to see Will leaning forward, face much closer than it had been. Will’s hand slid down to cup the side of Hannibal’s face. “Dr. Du Maurier said you were in love with me.”

It was far too late to deny, even if the vulnerability of it went against everything in Hannibal’s being. “I’m inclined to agree with her.”

Will barked a laugh, and then winced in pain. “Okay,” he said, still looking in Hannibal’s eyes. It sounded broken, endlessly sad and yet hopeful at the same time. “Okay.”

 

They healed. The stitches in Will’s face came out, then the ones in his shoulder, and in Hannibal’s abdomen. Will (who Chiyoh had grudgingly released from bed rest) spent almost every moment he was awake in Hannibal’s room, sometimes talking, sometimes just sitting and reading beside him. Some mornings Hannibal awoke to find Will curled up asleep in the chair at his bedside.

On the fifth day after Hannibal woke up, the day Chiyoh took out his stitches, she finally allowed him out of bed, as long as he didn’t try to lift any heavy things. Will took him by the arm and led him carefully around the little house, and Hannibal insisted on trying to cook something.

“I’ll help,” Will acquiesced, grinning.

Hannibal ended up sitting at the small table in the kitchen and slicing everything he could, then instructing Will on how to prepare it. It was surprisingly easy, though he couldn’t help thinking of when they’d cooked together before. It felt like another lifetime entirely. He watched Will pureeing tomatoes as he sliced zucchini and felt a smile creep over his face, unbidden. The uncertain future loomed before him, but for now, listening to Will start to hum as he moved gracefully around the kitchen, Hannibal was content, in a way he had not been for many years.

Will glanced over at him, and smiled. “I bet it feels good to be in a kitchen again, yeah?”

Hannibal let his answering grin take over his face. “It’s not as nice as the one I had in Baltimore, but yes, there is a certain joy in the familiar.”

Will laughed, free and easy, pouring the tomato puree into a baking dish. “I think you’d be hard pressed to find a cabin with a kitchen like your old one. I’m kinda impressed this place has a food processor, actually. It barely has electricity.”

Hannibal shrugged, smile still stretching his face. “Well, Chiyoh does know me fairly well.”

“Fair enough,” Will said. “I suppose if I were looking for a safe house for you, I would definitely make sure there was a decent kitchen.”

“Is that something you’ve given a lot of thought to? Looking for a house for me?” Hannibal teased lightly.

A red flush crept up Will’s neck. “Not exactly. Maybe.” He sighed. “It’s possible that I’ve given a great deal of thought to where we would have gone, if I’d said yes when you asked me to run away with you.”

Hannibal blinked in surprise, grateful that Will couldn’t see his face. “I wasn’t aware that you had ever seriously considered the offer.”

Will laughed. It sounded painful. “I didn’t, when you made it. I certainly did after.” He braced his hands on the counter and sighed, tension creeping up his spine and closing off his posture. “I saw Abigail for months. She kept telling me I should have gone with you. Made it hard not to think about.”

Hannibal took a moment to consider the implications of that. He knew that Abigail had died on his kitchen floor, which meant Will was describing either a hallucination, or, less probably, some kind of shade or spirit. Disregarding the supernatural (although he was struck by the conviction that if anyone could actually commune with the dead, it would be Will Graham), it was interesting to think that Will’s subconscious chose to manifest his desire to be with Hannibal in the guise of the girl they had once hoped to care for together. “I see,” he said carefully.

Will turned around and rolled his eyes. “Like you didn’t do that on purpose to upset me. Does it really surprise you that it did?” He shook his head. “I forgave you a long time ago. Doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt.”

“I suppose that’s...fair,” Hannibal said, returning to his sliced vegetables. “Although I do regret much of what happened that night.”

“I was going to say ‘I’m glad you handled my rejection better the second time around’, but you turned yourself in to the police and went to jail for three years, so. I’m not sure that can really be considered ‘better’.”

Hannibal chuckled. “I hoped you would return to me someday.”

“And I did.” Will hesitated, arranging red peppers in the dish. “I feel like I should apologize, but I’m not actually sorry.”

“I won’t pretend it wasn’t painful, but I would not have you be other than what you are.” Hannibal shrugged. “I forgave you some time ago, as well.”

“You haven't exactly had that long.”

“You were forgiven before we hit the water,” Hannibal said, and it felt like a confession.

Will let out a sharp exhale, and crossed to stand behind Hannibal, who was looking down at his cutting board. It was a surprise when he felt Will's hand on his shoulder, and he looked up into Will’s earnest gaze. “I am sorry. Not for what I did, but for the fact that it hurt you.”

Hannibal nodded slowly. “I'm sorry as well, in the same way. I can't promise that I won't hurt you again, but I intend to try.”

Will smiled, a soft twist of his lips. “We'll see. I'm not sure I can promise the same, honestly, but, well, I'm here.” He leaned forward and pressed a kiss to Hannibal's forehead. “I love you too, you know.”

It took Hannibal a moment to be able to speak, and in that time Will moved back over to the counter to continue layering vegetables for the ratatouille. When he did find his voice, all that came out was a hoarse rasp. “ _Will_.”

Will glanced over his shoulder and smiled. “Well, I guess it's good to know I can still surprise you.”

Hannibal laughed. “Oh, I think you'll always be able to surprise me.” He set down the knife and slid the zucchini into a bowl. “These are ready for you.”

Will touched him lightly on the shoulder again as he leaned around him to take the bowl, touching him casually as if they did so all the time, as if either of them was the sort of person who touched casually, and Hannibal couldn't help but feel warmed by it.

They finished the preparation and put the dish in the oven to cook in comfortable silence. Chiyoh came in as Will was setting the timer, and stood watching them from the doorway.

“I'm trying out some of your other ‘means of influence’,” Will said, seemingly apropos of nothing.

Chiyoh smiled. “And how is that working for you?”

Will smirked back. “It's progressing. So far, I haven't been stabbed, so I'd say it's an improvement.”

She looked between them and shook her head. “You two are a great deal more trouble than you are worth.”

Will laughed. “Well, we'll be out of your hair soon enough. I'm guessing he'll be able to travel by next week, and I'd like to get out of the country as soon as possible. We may be dead, but that doesn't mean no one's looking for us.”

“Where are you intending us to go?” Hannibal asked.

Will shrugged. “Somewhere with a decent kitchen and enough room for a few dogs.”

Hannibal smiled. “I think that can be arranged. Your timeline is good, although arrangements will need to be made…”

Chiyoh pulled a manila envelope out of the shoulder bag she was wearing. “Passports and driver's licenses for both of you, and the paperwork on a house in British Columbia, in Will's new name.”

“So eager to be rid of us?” Hannibal smiled.

“Like I said, more trouble than you're worth,” she said, but she was smiling too.

They ate together at the little table that night, and despite his injury and exhaustion, it was the best evening Hannibal had had in a long time.

 

A few nights later, Hannibal woke before the dawn to see Will asleep in the chair. It couldn't be later than three in the morning, and Will's back would be a wreck if he spent the whole night in such an uncomfortable position. “Will,” Hannibal said, reach out to touch his shoulder.

Blue eyes opened slowly. “Sorry,” Will said, blinking the rest of the way awake. “I'll go back to bed.”

“You could stay,” Hannibal suggested, the night making everything soft and simple. He shifted to the side of the bed and drew back the covers. “Please.”

Will stared for a long minute before shedding the robe he'd covered himself with and sliding into the bed. “Okay,” he said softly. “Don't stab me if I snore. Or sweat, or whatever.”

Hannibal just smiled, opening his arms and drawing Will close into his chest. Will snuggled into him without hesitation, curling as close as he could into Hannibal’s sleepy warmth. They were both asleep again within minutes.

Hannibal woke up still warm in Will’s embrace. He felt Will’s hand gently tracing his spine through his shirt and shifted into the caress.

Will’s answering chuckle was warm, heavy with sleepy affection. He pressed his lips gently against Hannibal’s throat and nuzzled into his collar. “G’morning.”

Hannibal smiled. “Good morning, Will.”

Will pulled his head back and squinted at Hannibal. “Hey. Can I kiss you?”

Hannibal nodded, and Will pressed their lips together with unexpected urgency, close-mouthed but intense, claiming. Hannibal kissed him back, shifting to improve the angle and pulling him closer with a hand on the back of his head. It was their first real kiss, and yet there was a sense of familiarity to it, a kind of homecoming, and Hannibal felt a rush of affection that nearly brought tears to his eyes.

“Thank you,” he said when Will pulled back to catch his breath.

Will laughed, low and amused. “That’s not the standard reaction. I mean, I haven’t even brushed my teeth yet.”

Hannibal kissed his forehead and nuzzled into his hair. “I’ve been waiting for that for a long time. I think I can handle a little morning breath.”

Will laughed again, face pressed against Hannibal’s chest and breath tickling his skin. “I’m still not entirely sure this is real. Molly’s going to wake me up in an hour so I can take Wally to school and feed the dogs, and this will just be one more dream I can’t tell her about.”

Hannibal was startled by the flare of jealousy he felt, even knowing that Will had chosen him. “And will it have been a good dream?”

“Yeah.” Will pulled back far enough to see Hannibal’s expression, reaching up to cup the side of his face. “The best. That’s why I couldn’t tell her. She knows all the bad stuff. Or, well, enough of it.”

“Did you love her? Do you?”

Will’s face closed off, and he took his hand away. “Don’t ask me that. I’m not going to lie to you and I was having a lovely morning staying alive.”

“I told you I don’t intend to hurt you.”

“You have more faith in your self-control than I do.” Will sighed. “Yes, I love her. How could I not? She’s clever and beautiful and perfect and she loved me despite everything.”

“And yet here you are.”

“You love me _because_ of everything,” Will said. “I can’t even begin to explain what it’s like to know that you want all of me, even the parts that everyone else would call flaws, the bits of me I’ve fought against since I was old enough to understand what they were. Jack looked at me and saw a weapon, but you looked at me and saw _art_.” He took a deep breath. “With Molly, everything was easy and soft. And I loved that. There will be times when I miss it.” He sighed. “But with you, I know who I am. I don’t have to shy away from myself and cling to a facade. I never shock you, and lord knows you’ll never cringe away from me in horror.” He laughed, and it came out bitter. “I won’t pretend that’s all it is. If I’m with you, I know they’ll be safe, and that’s important to me. That’s going to stay important to me,” he added pointedly, then paused. “And I’m obsessively in love with you, which helps, I guess. My relationship with you has always been more _passionate_ , after all.”

Hannibal stared at him. “I suppose it has.” He paused, weighing his next sentence. Honesty won out. “I find it difficult not to hate her, and the boy.”

Will sighed. “That's...understandable. Honestly if you'd run off and fallen in love with someone else I'd be pretty upset too.”

“I did run off with someone else.”

“Yeah, but you weren't in love with her, she was just conveniently there. Or inconveniently, I guess, some of the time.”

“You sound very certain about that.”

Will shrugged. “Reading people is what I do, darlin'. I'm not saying you don't like her—in fact, I'm sure you like her quite a bit. But it's nothing like the way you feel about me.”

Hannibal couldn't help but be amused by Will's sarcastic drawl on the word darling. He also couldn't deny the truth of Will's assessment of his relationship with Bedelia. “I've never felt the way I feel about you about anyone. I would have said it was impossible.”

“I know. Me too, I guess. I've definitely never felt this way before, anyway.” Will stretched his legs and shifted away.

“Time to face the day?” Hannibal asked as Will sat up.

“Yeah.” Will sighed. “I mean, since we've pretty thoroughly ruined whatever mood there was. Besides, there are some conversations I'd rather have when I wasn't cuddled into your chest.”

Hannibal swung his legs over his side of the bed and ran a hand through his hair. “Reasonable, I suppose, although I will admit to a preference for the position.”

Will smiled over his shoulder. “Somehow, I’m not surprised.” He sighed. “Come on, let’s eat something. Are you going to be ready to leave tomorrow?”

Hannibal nodded, although he had his back to Will. “I should be fine. Sitting in a car shouldn’t put any undue stress on my abdomen, and we should have no issues stopping.”

They’d been carefully monitoring the news, and the only mention of them had come the day after Dolarhyde’s death, several articles saying they had given their lives during the fight. There was no indication of a manhunt, no public warning to keep an eye out for the FBI’s most wanted. Even if there was still an internal investigation, no one was likely to recognize them in rural Wisconsin. They could be out of the country in less than six hours, and while Canada was not, perhaps, the safest country to flee to, the process of extradition was long and left many opportunities for escape. Eventually, they would likely move back to Europe, although perhaps Will would prefer to stay somewhere closer to home. Canada was, by all accounts, a pleasant place to live.

They made it through that morning without any further uncomfortable discussions, though Will seemed more withdrawn than he had since coming to the cabin. Hannibal couldn’t help feeling as if he had hurt him again, and he didn’t know how to fix it. He could have lied, said that Molly’s existence didn’t bother him, but that was no basis for the kind of relationship he was hoping to build. At this stage, he couldn’t imagine Will wanted anything less than honesty from him.

“Are you angry with me?” Hannibal asked as they were finishing dinner. Chiyoh stood and silently left the room, intentionally giving them privacy, and he felt a weight settle in his chest.

Will looked at him incredulously. “I don’t know that I would use the word ‘angry’. I’m not mad at you. I think a more accurate assessment would be that I have a renewed feeling of disquiet.”

“Towards me.”

Will inclined his head. “Towards you.”

“I was unaware that you had ever not been...disquieted by me.”

Will let out a dark chuckle. “I let some of that guard slip-slide away, these last few days. I’m shoring it back up again.”

“Because I dislike your wife?”

“Because you're dangerous, and it's too easy for me to forget that. How many more people are going to die because I fuck up and you throw a temper tantrum? And that's not even counting everyone that you're going to kill because you think they look _tasty_. I'm never going to see them as pigs the way you do, as _meat_.”

Hannibal sighed. It wasn't as if he hadn't known this conversation was coming, but he had hoped to put it off a little longer. “Are you asking me to stop?”

Will shook his head, frustrated. “No. You wouldn't, but you might agree if you thought it would appease me and then I'd be even angrier when you did. And in a way, it's as much a part of you as any of the other arts you practice, and I would hardly ask you to stop drawing or cooking. But I'm not going to pretend it doesn't bother me.” He sighed. “I can't help but feel responsible, and I can't… Obviously, you matter to me more than them, but there's a difference between people like Dolarhyde, or even a stranger, and someone like Abigail.” His voice cracked slightly on the name. “You don't like Molly, fine. That's reasonable. No one in your position would. But I need to know you aren't going to try to kill her again. Her or Wally. And until then I have to be careful.” He stood, shoving his chair back from the table with unnecessary force and striding out of the room before Hannibal could come up with any kind of response.

Needless to say, they slept in separate beds that night.


	2. Day One (Wisconsin to Winnipeg)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m going to be out of town tomorrow so here’s chapter two (I’ll probably shoot for Tuesday updates from now on and...see. I have through chapter four done). 
> 
> Here we see the beginning of the Talks in the Car!! Also all the info on the drive is as accurate as possible from 2015, from the perspective of someone who has never been there but did an unfortunate amount of research into things like fish statues

“Okay, this isn't going to work,” Will said, as they drove out of Duluth.

They'd been on the road for two hours, and Hannibal had been trying to respect the boundaries Will had talked about the night before. “What isn't?”

Will took his eyes off the road to glare at him, drumming his fingers on steering wheel. “I'm not sitting in a car with you for thirty hours if you're giving me the silent treatment.”

“It will likely be closer to thirty-four.”

“Deflection, Hannibal? Isn't that a little beneath you?”

Hannibal allowed himself a small sigh. “I thought you would appreciate some space, after the conversation we had last night.”

“Ah, so you figured you'd help me accept that I made the right decision by ignoring me. I love your logic on that one, all that psychological training going to real good use.” Will's tone was acerbic.

Hannibal took a deep breath through his nose. “I don't know what you expected me to say. You're angry, which I understand, but I don't want to fight you.”

Will's grip on the wheel tightened. “We aren't going to be able to live together if you're walking on eggshells any time you think I might get upset.”

“Then what would you have me do? I know I've hurt you. I can't bring Abigail back to you, and I can't change the fact that I want Molly dead.” Hannibal paused, noting Wills sharp inhale. “Is that what you wanted? To hear me say it?”

“I wanted you to be honest with me.”

“Fine. I want her dead. I've fantasized about killing her, feeding her and the boy to you. Making you eat her heart.” Hannibal let his voice linger on the last word. “If you had tried to go back to them, it's likely I would have. Although I would have killed Alana and her family first. Does that make you feel better? Do you feel like you're saving lives now? Virtuous little Will Graham. You can tell yourself you aren't here because you want to be, you just had to _save_ everyone. Staying with me out of a purely altruistic instinct.”

“Stop,” Will said, hitting the wheel hard enough for the sound to reverberate. “Stop it, okay. I get it.” He took a shaky breath. Hannibal waited. “The worst part is I can't even tell if you're being honest now.”

“I am, I assure you.” He let that hang in the air as the landscape flew past them. “I can't tell you what I'll do if you leave. I was surprised at the force of my anger the first time, and at my lack of it the second. I may do nothing. I may kill you all. I can't promise you anything.”

“Can you at least promise me that you won't go looking for them? Or, no. I don't know. I want to stay with you because I love you, okay, you're right, that's selfish. It's selfish that I'm not crashing this car into the biggest tree I can find and crushing you inside it. It's selfish, in fact, for me to want to be able to be with you and to want my wife and son to be able to live normal lives without me. But you know what? I had a friend who used to tell me that I matter, that my wants and needs were at least as important as anyone else's. And dear god, Hannibal, if you think I'd just sit idly by while you killed them then I'm not sure you ever knew me at all.” He took a breath. “So. You say you're not sure what you'll do. I am sure about what I'll do. If you ever so much as look them up to find out where they've moved to, I will kill you. I will be miserable about it for the rest of my godforsaken life, but I won't hesitate.”

“I will fight back, of course.” Hannibal almost smiled. 

“Of course.” Will said, then deflated slightly. “I'm not afraid of dying. I still think it would be easier.”

“Do I need to be worried?” He hadn’t really thought of Will’s throwing them off a cliff as a suicide attempt, and yet it had been. 

“No, god no. I wouldn’t.” Will was appalled enough that Hannibal relaxed slightly. “I’m not going to leave you, I’m sure I’ve said that. And I don’t really intend to die without taking you with me.”

Hannibal smiled. “Good.”

Will sighed heavily, spreading his fingers wide on the steering wheel. “Well, this is a fun car ride. Let’s talk about killing each other! My favorite!”

“Clearly we have some issues we need to work through,” Hannibal said, amused. 

“I’d say we do.” Will rolled his eyes. “I’m pretty sure I’ve written articles describing relationships like ours. And I don’t write about good things.”

“I will concede that it has some flaws. But then, by society's standards, we are flawed people.”

“True.” Will sighed again. “We should stop somewhere before we get to the border, those crossings can take forever and it would be a good plan to stretch our legs.”

Hannibal nodded, as grateful for the subject change as Will seemed to be. He pulled out his phone and looked up the next rest stop. “There should be a rest area in about 20 miles. With flush toilets, no less.”

Will huffed a laugh. “Woohoo!”

“You know, this isn’t the first time we’ve driven through Minnesota together,” Hannibal said after a minute.

“Why do you think I needed to talk? Those memories are still there, just waiting to leap out at me. It’s easier to be mad at you about potential future transgressions than to think about the last time we were here together.”

“My memories are not all so bad.” Hannibal paused. “Although I understand why yours may be.”

“I think the only good memory I have of Minnesota is that morning you brought me breakfast.” Will’s eyes went distant for an instant, then cleared. He looked over at Hannibal with a raised eyebrow. “I assume the sausage was human flesh?”

Hannibal grinned. “It was my first opportunity to feed you. Of course it was human. As I recall, a particularly unpleasant bank teller.”

Will laughed. “You’re unbelievable, you know that?”

“It’s one of the things you like best about me, as I understand it.” 

“I still can’t believe this is my life. It seems surprisingly fitting, really, but I would never have considered this as a possible direction for my life to go.”

“Fleeing the country with a serial killer?”

“Casually discussing cannibalism with the man I’ve chosen to spend my life with after we faked our deaths by jumping off a cliff.”

Hannibal pursed his lips in mock-thoughtfulness. “I can see you have a point. If it’s any consolation, I never considered that this would be something I could freely discuss with anyone and have them still accept me, either.”

“Yeah, guess it’s not the kind of thing you can just casually mention at the opera, is it?” Will snorted, and then groaned. “God, you’re going to make me come to all your fancy dinners now, aren’t you?”

“It would behoove us to keep a low profile for a time, but yes. I imagine I will want to host more people for dinner, and since those dinners will be held in your home, it would be quite rude of you to refuse to make an appearance.”

“I’m not going to promise to be sociable.”

“I’m sure these hypothetical dinner guests won’t mind. You can just sit there and look pretty, and I will talk for you.” In truth, Hannibal hoped that by the time they were hosting dinner parties, Will would be much more comfortable in high society. 

“I’m sure they’ll love the dogs, too.”

“I have faith that we will find a compromise.”

“I imagine we will.” Will was smiling. “We’ve gotten past worse things.”

“True. Although I do hope any conflicts surrounding hospitality will be resolved with fewer near-death experiences.”

Will laughed. “Are you, Hannibal Lecter, the Chesapeake Ripper, actually advocating for _less_ bloodshed?”

“I’ve discovered that my life, without you in it, is quite dull.”

“Yeah,” Will said, and it came out like a sigh. “Me too, unfortunately.” He smiled. “I’ll try not to kill you over dinner.”

“And I, you.”

 

They didn’t have any trouble at the border—they hit it around noon, so there was almost no wait, and they didn’t have much with them: two suitcases, mostly clothes, and no food, so nothing to declare. It took less than ten minutes, and then they were in Canada.

Will let out a sigh of relief once they were across the bridge and safely on foreign soil. “Well, that’s the worst over, right?”

“We were unlikely to have any trouble, even then.”

Will shook his head, smiling. “Customs made me nervous even before I was transporting a wanted criminal. I’m always worried I’ll have a forgotten potato under my seat or something that they catch in a random search.”

“A potato?” Hannibal asked.

“They’re illegal to transport internationally. Realistically, I know nothing serious would happen, but you would get held up.” Will shrugged. “I’ve never liked that kind of scrutiny. Makes me feel like I have something to hide, even when I didn’t.”

“I was concerned that they would question you about the mark on your face. It’s rather...distinctive.”

“Well, nobody but you, me, and poor Francis Dolarhyde knows to connect it with me.” Will shrugged again. 

Hannibal shifted in his seat. “Yes, but they are more likely to remember us because of it. A very attractive man with a large wound on his face is more remarkable than a merely very attractive man.”

Will laughed. “Did you just call me ‘very attractive’?”

Hannibal smiled at him, letting a little heat creep into the expression. “Are you truly so surprised?”

“I think you’re biased.”

“I think you’d be surprised how many people would agree with me.”

Will shook his head. “I’ve never responded very well to flattery.”

“No,” Hannibal conceded. “Certainly not flattery regarding your physical appearance.”

“Are there other kinds of flattery I do respond well to?”

“Not, perhaps, in the traditional sense,” Hannibal said, thinking about how Will reacted to being told that his gifts were anything other than a curse. “But I would argue that you are much more self-confident than you were when we met. Some of that confidence has been built through positive reinforcement.”

Will shrugged. “Maybe. Mostly, praise makes me uncomfortable.”

“Because you feel you don’t deserve it, or because you don’t like the attention?”

“I’ve never liked attention, you know that. People don’t see enough, or they see too much, and I don’t know how to navigate either.”

“Whereas I have always enjoyed creating a character for others to appreciate.”

“Which bring the conversation back around to why you enjoy dinner parties and I want no part of them.” Will sighed. “Actually, no. We’re going to be stuck in this car for another two days, and I’m really not interested in having the same argument twice in three hours. We’ll figure it out.”

Hannibal nodded. “As you wish. We should stop for lunch soon.”

“That’s going to be a sight. You eating commercially prepared food. Alana didn’t even force it on you in the hospital.” 

Hannibal winced. “An unfortunate necessity. We can get groceries tonight, I’ve made reservations at a hotel with a stove in Winnipeg.”

Will smirked. “Of course you did. That’s, what, ten hours today?”

“Approximately. I’ll drive after lunch.”

“Are you up to it? I’m not that tired yet, I can keep going.”

Hannibal considered. The pain in his abdomen was present, but not worrisome, and he felt alert. “I should be.”

“Yeah, okay.” Will glanced over at him. “I don’t want you straining yourself, though. If this has to take four days instead of three I won’t complain.”

Hannibal smiled. “All the same, I’d like to get where we’re going. And I did make reservations.”

“And it would be _rude_ to cancel without notice, I’m sure. In all this planning, did you find a place to eat? Because I have a feeling you aren’t going to be happy with Tim Horton’s.”

Hannibal frowned. “No. Unfortunately we missed most of what lovely Fort Frances had to offer, but there should be a place in Emo.”

“Emo? Really?”

“It’s the name of a town.”

“Is it a town full of kids with dyed hair who listen to loud music and talk about death?”

“Will,” Hannibal said quellingly.

“Sorry. It is kind of funny, though. Wally would think it was hilarious,” Will said, and then frowned. “Sorry.”

Hannibal sighed. “You’re used to having a family, demanding you forget would be impossible.”

“Doesn’t stop you from wanting to.”

“No, it doesn’t.” Hannibal paused, looking out the window. “I am, however, aware that they will likely remain on your mind for some time, perhaps indefinitely. I will adjust.”

“Just as long as you adjusting doesn’t involve them dying,” Will said, shaking his head. “It’s odd to be out of sync with you like this.”

“Time and distance have affected both of us, and you have had experiences we have not shared. Experiences you are uncomfortable sharing.”

“I’ve never really had something I didn’t feel like I could tell you before. You always just took whatever I threw at you.”

“I still prefer your honesty to your silence.”

“I don’t exactly enjoy upsetting you—in any sense. And…” Will paused, eyes on the road. “I’m not sure I _want_ to tell you about them. You were my life, and then they were, and it was like it was a different world altogether. And now I’m back in your world. It feels like if I don’t talk about them then they can stay there in that other world and not be sullied by the darkness in this one.”

“A perfectly valid psychological position.” Hannibal forced down the jealousy he felt and looked out the window. “The turn should be soon.”

“We just passed a sign that said that Emo was 12 kilometers away.”

“Ah,” Hannibal said, uncertain how to continue. He didn’t want to fight with Will any more than Will wanted to fight with him, and it seemed they had a shortage of safe topics of conversation. Instead of speaking, he watched out the window as the open fields around them gave way to loose forest, spindly deciduous tree with only the buds of leaves mixed with the occasional conifer. He didn’t know enough about this region to know what kind of trees they were, and he wondered if Will knew. It seemed safer not to ask him.

After a few minutes of silence, Will sighed. “This is harder than I thought it would be.”

“For both of us,” Hannibal agreed. “We’ll feel better after we’ve eaten.”

“If there’s anything you’ll eat in this town. It doesn’t exactly look like we’re coming up on a metropolis.” They passed a sign advertising the Emo Inn “Motel, restaurant, and sports bar” in garish font

“According to TripAdvisor, people enjoy the food at ‘Circle D Restaurant’,” Hannibal said, looking at his phone.

Will snorted. “You’re kidding.”

“Unfortunately not.” Hannibal sighed. “There aren’t a lot of fine dining establishments in rural Ontario.”

“Yeah, and you’re right; everything is more stressful when we’re hungry. We’ve been on the road for almost six hours.”

“Your shoulder must be hurting you.”

Will shrugged. “I guess. It was pretty fucked up anyway, I’m sort of used to it.”

“All the same.” They passed a sign welcoming them to Emo, population 1200. “I’m sorry to burden you with the bulk of the driving.”

“It’s fine. I’m not the one who got shot.” He looked out the window. “You know what side of the road this is going to be on?”

“It should be on the left, in about 2 kilometers,” Hannibal said, checking his phone. 

“This whole kilometers thing is going to take some getting used to.”

Hannibal smiled. “I have every confidence you’ll adjust.”

Will laughed. “I’m sure.”

The restaurant, when they found it, was unimpressive. A low, gray building with a blue roof and a faded sign proclaiming RESTAURANT that looked like it had hung there since the fifties.

“Are you sure about this?” Will asked, hesitating before getting out of the car. “They have to have a grocery store here, we could get some apples or something and try the next town.”

“The next town that might have something better is Winnipeg, unfortunately.” Hannibal supposed Will’s concern was touching, in a way, but he disliked being thought of as someone incapable of making necessary compromises. “Come. I have eaten worse things, I can assure you.”

“Yeah, okay. I just hope we don’t get food poisoning.” He climbed out of the car, locking it and pocketing the keys.

“I’d have thought you’d enjoy sampling the local cuisine.” Hannibal said as they walked to the restaurant.

Will shrugged instead of responding, holding the door open for him. 

The inside was mostly empty. A waitress hurried over at the sound of the bell above the door. “Just you two gentlemen this afternoon?”

Hannibal nodded, and she led them to a booth. The green upholstery was worn and faded, but it looked clean and cared for. The whole place had a well-loved feeling, and Hannibal found that he didn’t have to force the smile he turned on the waitress.

The food, when it came, was at best mediocre, but it was hot and filling, and it made Will smile, so Hannibal felt it would do. 

 

“That could have been much worse,” Will said, sliding into the passenger seat. “I mean, the food was pretty okay for a place in the middle of nowhere. And the waitress was nice.”

Hannibal started the car, looking behind them as he pulled out of the tiny lot. “I have had worse dining experiences, I agree.”

“And I do feel better.” Will sighed, tipping his head back against the headrest. “I’m sorry I’m such shit company.”

“I have never had an issue with your company, Will,” Hannibal said firmly. 

“I know.” Will shifted, looking out the window. “I just—you know.”

“I do,” Hannibal said, amused. “Perhaps, instead of dwelling on what is now in the past, it would benefit us to discuss our future?”

“Yeah, okay.” Will sighed again. “It feels like we’re in this liminal space between the ghosts of our past and the uncertainty of the future. Like standing on the edge of a cliff and not knowing if it’s rocks or water below.”

“I would argue that the choice that faces us now is every bit as precipitous as the literal cliff we faced only weeks ago.”

“And no Chiyoh to drag us out of the water.” Will wrapped his arms around his chest. “But we’ve already jumped off the cliff, and this trip is just the long fall down.”

Hannibal conceded this with a nod. “What will you do when we reach British Columbia?”

“What will _you_ do?”

“I had considered offering music lessons. Less attention getting than my other skills.”

“To kids?” Will sounded incredulous. “What instrument?”

“I’m partial to the harpsichord, although I would likely start with a piano. And yes, to children, or whoever wanted to learn.”

“I’ve never heard you play,” Will said thoughtfully. “And I wouldn’t have thought you’d like working with kids.”

“I have no objection to children.”

“They’re messy and rude and they don’t listen well.”

“So are you, a lot of the time.”

Will shrugged. “Yeah, but that’s different. There’s an emotional investment that supersedes traits you might otherwise find aggravating. And I’m not that messy.”

“You do tend to be covered in dog hair,” Hannibal pointed out. “But I see your point. Perhaps I also have an emotional investment in children. There is something fascinating about developing minds—so impressionable and open.”

“Do I need to be worried about the kind of influence you want to have over these hypothetical children?”

“I don’t intend to exert any influence over them that one wouldn’t expect from an instructor.” Hannibal glanced at Will. “I don’t enjoy hurting children, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“Good,” Will said, releasing a breath. “I would apologize for thinking that of you, but.”

Hannibal smiled, shaking his head. “I understand.”

“I could try teaching again, I guess, but there’s a lot of background checks for that kind of thing.” Will said after some time had passed.

“You need not work if you prefer not to.”

“I think I’ll go crazy if I don’t find something to do. Even I have a limit on how long I can sit in a house playing with dogs.”

“I believe the house has some land, you could open a dog rescue.”

Will shook his head. “If anyone’s looking for us, that would be the first thing they’d look for. Two men, running a dog sanctuary and having fancy dinner parties—it’s like a neon sign telling Jack where we’ve gone.” 

“There are several universities in the Vancouver area. Creating a background sufficient to garner a professorship is not as difficult as you might believe.”

“Maybe.” Will shrugged. “Worst case I can always do mechanic work. I guess I have time to think about if I want to find something else.”

“You have as much time as you desire. As far as the people of the town are concerned, we will simply be a wealthy couple who moved to the countryside to ‘get away’ after your unfortunate accident.”

“There’s a marriage certificate in that envelope of paperwork, you know. Speaking of us being a couple.” Will sounded uncomfortable, like he’d been wanting to bring this up but hadn’t had an opportunity.

“I saw it. Does it bother you?” Hannibal was careful to keep any hint of emotion out of his voice.

“No—I mean, not the way you mean.” He paused. “I don’t mind being tied to you. I like it. Having a piece of paper to confirm that this crazy connection isn’t all in my head is—nice. But, well, Molly.”

“Ah,” Hannibal said slowly. “Do you feel that by escalating your relationship with me you are being unfaithful to her?”

“Not really. Well, I guess, yeah. I mean, we’re dead. So I guess that’s the end of that, you know? But it’s...odd. It cheapens the significance of that loss to be remarried already.” He laughed self-deprecatingly. “It cheapens it to even be in a relationship, I guess, but it’s not like I didn’t know that was where we were headed when I decided to break you out of prison.”

Hannibal considered his response to that. He was frustrated that they kept coming back to this, even if it was logical. He spoke carefully, in a flat tone that betrayed nothing of his emotions. “If it would be easier for you to wait before engaging in romantic and sexual behaviors, that can be done.”

Will shook his head, letting out a sharp exhale and staring fixedly out the window. His voice was raw as he said, “No, I that’s not what I—god, do you have any idea how much I _want_ you? I feel like I could crawl inside your skin and we still wouldn’t be close enough. I can hardly think of anything else. When I realized that you wanted me _back_ I...well. No, I don’t want to not be with you, I just want you to understand that it’s strange for me.”

“I thought you knew.” Hannibal looked over at Will and put a hand on his thigh, relieved when Will didn’t flinch away. “I thought I was fairly obvious.”

Will stared hard at the hand on his leg. “I didn’t know. Not consciously, anyway. There was a time when I thought you might be attracted to the killer you thought I was becoming, but. It wasn’t until I was talking to Dr. Du Maurier and I realized—I don’t know what I’d been thinking. I guess I thought you thought I was an interesting plaything, that you enjoyed watching me fall apart and then seeing how the pieces could go back together again. It never occurred to me to think that you were as emotionally compromised by the whole thing as I was.”

“I was,” Hannibal said tightly. “I don’t know if I could explain how much you have affected me, Will. You told me once that you had changed me. I didn’t realize how much. I am somewhat accustomed to loss, but the loss of you...I could not bear it again, and there is not much I could not bear.”

“No, there really isn’t.” Will covered Hannibal’s hand with his own. “I’m not planning to go anywhere.”

Hannibal turned his hand up and squeezed Will’s gently. “No. I think we are both done with running from this connection.”

Will just squeezed his hand back.

Their hands remained linked as Hannibal drove on. The fields became less and less frequent, broken up by huge boulders and spots where the road had clearly been blasted into rock. They were climbing steadily, and soon they passed a large lake directly alongside the road. After that, there was water next to them more often than not, and the wilderness around them grew progressively more wild. Instead of farms, they started seeing campgrounds. Everyone seemed to have a boat.

“I wonder how the fishing is near Langley,” Will mused as they passed yet another boat dock. “Can we get a boat? Or would that be too ostentatious?”

“We can buy a boat if you want one.” Hannibal squeezed his hand. “I want you to be happy with our new life. We will find a place for you to fish.”

Will shook his head slightly. “It’s not that important.”

Hannibal scoffed. “Will. Asking you to give up fishing would be no more productive than asking me to stop hunting. It is a part of who you are. Yes, you could live without it, as I could live without, but would you be happy?” He released Will’s hand, bringing his hand up to trace the side of Will’s face instead. “No. There are rivers and lakes in British Columbia, and the Pacific Ocean less than an hour away. I am certain there is somewhere to fish.”

Will leaned slightly into Hannibal’s hand. “Okay.”

“We don’t have to stay, if you don’t like it. We could go anywhere, do anything.”

Will straightened, letting Hannibal’s hand fall. “We’ll have to stay for a little while, leaving too soon would only attract attention.”

“But, if we’re gone, what does it matter? We can become some other couple, some other place. In a few years, no one will remember our faces. No one will catch us.”

“You’re very confident for a man who just got out of a secure mental health facility.”

“I was only caught because I wanted to be.” He paused. “And because my companion wanted me to be.”

“I don’t want you to be caught,” Will said firmly. “I wish you were dead, but I don’t think locking you up did much good at all.”

“At least we can still be honest with each other.” Hannibal gripped the steering wheel with both hands. 

“I told you, I’m done trying to kill you. Doesn’t mean I don’t wish it had worked.”

“You did not expect to be able to survive. In a way, we did not. What we choose to do with this second life is entirely ours to decide.”

“Dead men travelling the corpse road,” Will said, and sighed. “It’s a beginning I never thought I wanted.”

“You could have gone back. You were well enough to leave before I could even stand. You could have killed me, and gone back to your wife and son and your normal life.”

“Chiyoh…”

“She left on a regular schedule, you could easily have avoided her.” Hannibal held up a hand. “Please, Will. We both know you were more than capable, and arguing about it will only upset you. I accept that it felt to you as if you had no choice. But if you truly had wanted to, you could have left. Perhaps you didn’t think you could kill me; you still could have left. Told Jack I was dead and that it had taken you this long to make it back to civilization. Told Jack I was alive and keeping you prisoner, and you’d only just escaped. They know what I’ve done to you, they would have believed you. Anyone else could say they hadn’t thought of those things, but you are not just anyone, Will.”

“Alright. So, I stayed because, on some level, I thought this was the best alternative. That’s...fair. I wanted to. But it was never a conscious decision.” He ran a hand through his hair. “We were fighting Dolarhyde, and he threw you off and I thought, ‘no’. I couldn’t let him kill you. And when we didn’t die it wasn’t even an option.” His voice dropped to a hoarse whisper. “There was nothing for me to go back to.” 

Hannibal wanted to touch him again, offer what meager comfort he could for the pain in Will’s voice, but every tense line in Will’s posture said that touch would not help but hurt. “And yet you still chastise yourself for leaving them behind.”

“They deserve better.” Will let out a frustrated huff of breath. “I know it must feel to you as if I keep going back and forth on this, but the decision is already made. I’m with you, I’m not going back.”

“I’d prefer it if you said that with slightly less resignation.”

“Resignation is what you’re getting. I won’t pretend I don’t want this, but I’m also not going to pretend I’m happy about running off into the sunset with someone who has abused me in the ways you have.”

“I have missed your particular brand of blunt honesty,” Hannibal said, with a sad smile.

Will closed his eyes and leaned his head against the window. “I wish I didn’t love you.”

“I must admit, I have often felt the same.” Hannibal watched the road ahead of them as they went around a bend. “We make quite a pair.”

Will huffed a laugh, gaze fixed on the scenery out the window, but otherwise didn’t respond. 

Hannibal gripped the steering wheel tighter and focused on keeping himself calm. Will had every right to ignore him. If there was any chance of them having a true partnership, then Will had to be allowed to make his own decisions, even when those didn’t align with Hannibal’s. That was just easier to remember when the argument was over dogs or dinner parties. He let the silence settle and concentrated on the road ahead of them.

He took the turn off for Kenora; they needed gas, and there wouldn’t be anywhere to stop until they got to Winnipeg, which was still nearly three hours away. Will didn’t comment as he pulled into the gas station, just got out and headed inside, presumably to find a restroom. Hannibal reminded himself that Will not talking to him was not a problem and pumped the gas. He used the facilities himself and returned to find Will sitting on the hood of the car, eating a stick of red licorice. 

“Want a redvine?” Will asked, holding out the box. 

Hannibal blinked at him. This was so opposite from what he was expecting that it took him a moment to recover. “No, thank you.”

Will shrugged, jumping off the hood. “I figured, but it seemed rude not to offer. You good to keep driving?”

“I’m fine.”

“I got some bottled water, too.” Will slid into the passenger seat.

“Thank you,” Hannibal said, unfreezing and getting into the car. He took the bottle Will offered him and drank quickly before starting the car and getting back onto the road. “Hydration is important.”

“That’s what they tell me.” Will offered him a lopsided grin. “I would apologize for being a terrible travel companion, but I did that already. It’s not like you didn’t know what you were getting.”

“As I said before, I have no issue with your company.”

“That’s because you’re crazy about me.” Will laughed gently.

Hannibal shrugged, smiling. “Perhaps. I won’t deny it.”

“I did miss you,” Will said softly, grin slipping off his face. “I didn’t want to, didn’t want to ever think about you again, but. Sometimes something would remind me—all kinds of things, from someone speaking french to one of the dogs looking at me in a specific way. I couldn’t talk about it with Molly. Hating you, she could understand. But missing you?” He shook his head. “It feels like something more inevitable than love. Like from that first moment in Jack’s office we had a connection, and we couldn’t shake it, no matter how badly we both may have wanted to.”

“There are forces in this world beyond even my control,” Hannibal acknowledged. 

“They say fate works in mysterious ways.” Will sighed, and then did a double take. “Is that a giant fish statue?”

Hannibal looked out his window at the forty foot tall statue. “I believe it is.”

Will pulled out his phone. “Husky the Muskie, according to google. A muskellunge, apparently. One of Ontario’s must-see attractions!”

Hannibal shook his head. “What will they think of next?”

“Like your aesthetic isn’t equally over-the-top.” Will let out a breath of laughter. “I’m vetoing creepy skulls as decor right now, by the way. “

“I’d like to get a look at the house before making any decorating decisions.”

“I’m just saying. None of that gothic serial killer vibe you had going back in Baltimore, okay?”

“I am willing to compromise on everything but the kitchen.”

“Since I assume you mean things like countertops and appliances, and not terrifying chandeliers, that’s fine.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” Hannibal had been intending to make this home into one that was as much Will’s as his own, anyway. He wondered if Will truly understood how much he would compromise for him.

Will pulled another redvine out of the package and took a bite. “This doesn’t bother you, does it?”

Hannibal shook his head. “Go ahead.”

“Do you like candy at all?” Will asked. “I know you eat sweet things—you make damn good desserts—but I don’t think I’ve ever seen you eat anything like a candy bar.”

“I’m not particularly partial to overprocessed sugars, no. I do enjoy a nice, high quality truffle every now and then. And I often make homemade candies at Christmas.”

“So, I don’t get out of buying you chocolates for Valentine’s day?”

Hannibal smiled. “We could make some together, perhaps. I shudder to think what your selection would be.”

“Molly usually got a box from the grocery store.”

“Chock full of high fructose corn syrup, I’m sure.”

Will laughed. “Probably, yeah.”

“It disgusts me how much of that people fill their bodies with. From both a personal and medical perspective.”

“It’s pretty gross.” Will shrugged, taking another bite of his candy. “But it’s what there is. Not everyone has the proper combination of time, energy, and expertise to make all their own food the way you like to. Or the money to buy fancy organic foods”

Hannibal inclined his head. “I do have certain privileges. Money, specifically, has gotten me much farther than I could have come without it.”

“It’s gotten us here. I certainly couldn’t have just up and bought a house in another country on a moment’s notice, much less the car and the papers to get us there.”

“Chiyoh is wealthy in her own right. My aunt and uncle left us each a fortune when they passed. Most of my assets are still accessible to me, of course; this was an eventuality I planned for carefully.”

“Of course.” Will paused. “It’s odd to think that I don’t have to get a real job if I don’t want one.”

“I find that without something to occupy my days, the boredom becomes intolerable.”

“I don’t imagine that a bored you is a very good thing for the surrounding community.”

Hannibal smiled. “Probably not.”

 

He drove through the countryside as the afternoon faded towards evening—this far north, the sun wouldn’t set until after 8pm, but the traffic got heavier the closer they got to Winnipeg, and it was nearly 5:30 by the time they crossed into Manitoba. Sometime around six, Hannibal glanced over and saw that Will had fallen asleep, head pillowed against the window. He’d always liked watching Will sleep. When he wasn’t wracked by nightmares, some of the tension slid off his face, making him look younger and less weary. Hannibal wished there was some way for him to relieve that tension in Will’s waking life, but Will needed to do so for himself. Perhaps that time would come sooner now, as opposed to later, but at this point Hannibal was not going to push. Will had come to him on his own, he would come into himself on his own as well.

They reached the outskirts of Winnipeg around seven. Will was still asleep, and Hannibal was tired, driving and his injury both taking their toll. He’d meant to stop at a grocery store before finding the hotel, but perhaps that could wait. They’d need to eat again today, but it seemed that getting settled into their hotel would need to come first. It was another twenty minutes before he found the hotel—he could have woken Will and asked him to look up directions, but the route had seemed straightforward and he remembered the address of the hotel. He didn’t get too lost, so there was no need. 

Will woke up as soon as the engine cut off, sitting up and blinking sleepily. “Sorry.” He yawned. “I didn’t mean to fall asleep. Where are we?”

“The hotel I booked us. I was just about to go get checked in.”

Will nodded, unbuckling his seatbelt. “Go ahead. I’ll grab the bags, you’re not supposed to be lifting anything heavy anyway.”

“Of course, _Doctor_ Graham.”

Will swatted at him. “I’m allowed to worry about you.”

Hannibal smiled at him. “Yes, I suppose you are.” He got out of the car. “I’ll see you inside.”

The woman at the check in counter was very polite and there were no issues with the reservation. By the time Will followed him in with their suitcases, he had the key cards and a sheet of paper listing the wifi password and breakfast times, not that they’d be eating the hotel breakfast. The woman had also been kind enough to give him the name of the closest grocery store, scrawled in blue pen across the top of the sheet. 

“All good?” Will asked, coming up behind him.

“Yes, very. Thank you,” he said to the desk clerk, gesturing Will ahead of him to the elevators. “We’re in room 312.”

“Great,” Will said, punching the up arrow. “And we have a stove? Did you stop at a grocery store?”

The elevator arrived, and they got in. Hannibal pushed the button for the third floor. “We should, yes, and no. I didn’t want to wake you.”

“Thanks, I guess.” Will scrubbed a hand over the back of his neck and yawned. “Driving always really takes it out of me.”

Hannibal nodded, putting a hand over his mouth as he yawned as well. 

Will stared at him. “Did you just—yawn?”

“They say it’s contagious. And I am also quite tired.”

“You’re a lot more human when you’re tired.” 

“Despite my best efforts, I am always human.”

“You know what I mean,” Will said as the elevator stopped on their floor.

“Yes, I suppose I do.” Hannibal couldn’t help another yawn. “Apologies.”

“It’s actually kind of...cute.” Will followed him into the room, dropping the bags on the table in the little kitchen. “And grounding.”

“Interesting phrasing.”

“Usually you’re so over the top that it feels like I’ve entered some weird other world with different rules.” Will shrugged. “It’s nice to be reminded that, at the end of the day, you’re just a man.”

“I’m not sure if I should be insulted by that.”

“Don’t be.” Will walked over to him and hugged him. 

Hannibal tensed for a second, not having expected the gesture, and then brought his arms up around Will, drawing him close against his chest. “Not that I don’t welcome it, but what brought this on?”

“You,” Will mumbled into Hannibal’s shirt before pulling his head back enough to speak more clearly. “You, being all human. It occurred to me that, as a human, you might need the reassurance as much as anyone else would.” He paused, pressing a kiss to Hannibal’s throat, there and then gone. “Also, I just really wanted to touch you. I am allowed to touch you, right?”

“Most certainly.” Hannibal kissed Will’s forehead gently. “I’d rather there weren’t any barriers between us.”

“Is that why you got a room with just one bed?”

“The couch pulls out, if you’d prefer I slept there.” Hannibal carefully stepped away from Will, letting his hands linger on Will’s back before moving off to check what equipment the kitchen had.

“No, of course not. I was kidding. I’m not making my husband sleep on the couch.” Will paused. “That wasn’t as weird as I thought it might be.”

“I liked it.” Hannibal concentrated on counting bowls to prevent himself from expressing just how much it pleased him to hear Will refer to him in such casually possessive terms. “Do you have any requests for dinner?”

“Something you can make quickly, I guess. Do you want me to go to the store for you? You’ve got to be exhausted.” 

“I prefer to select my own produce, but I will let you drive, if you don’t mind.” 

“Of course.”

 

Hannibal ended up making a simple caesar salad with anchovies and chicken. It wasn’t up to his usual standards, but it was better than going to another questionable restaurant, and even tired he enjoyed the routine of preparing food. Will certainly wasn’t complaining—he offered help where he could, and ate with a focused enthusiasm that Hannibal knew came from enjoyment. 

They’d bought ingredients at the grocery store for breakfast and lunch tomorrow; Hannibal had intended to prepare their lunch tonight, but fatigue won out and he decided to leave it until the morning. He let Will clear the dishes and went to take a shower, eager to wash the grime of travel off himself. Tomorrow would be even worse—the drive to Calgary would take nearly thirteen hours, not including necessary stops, and they were already tired. He had miscalculated how much his injury was still affecting him, and how much Will’s must be affecting him. They could make it, but it would be a much more gruelling task than he had anticipated.

Hannibal finished his shower and dressed in clean pajamas. He’d hoped to feel refreshed, but felt, if anything, more exhausted than before. A cloud of steam followed him out into the hotel room, where he found Will sitting on the bed, still dressed, phone pressed to one ear as he looked at something on his tablet.

“Okay, thanks.” Will was saying into the phone. “Yes, thank you. You too. Bye.” He hung up and looked at Hannibal. “That was our hotel in Calgary, I got them to push the reservation back a night. And I found this place in Regina, Saskatchewan, that’s got a stove in the room and a full refrigerator available for tomorrow night—I didn’t want to book it until you saw it.”

Hannibal stared at Will for a second. “You knew I didn’t think we could make it to Calgary tomorrow?”

Will shrugged. “Or I didn’t think we could make it to Calgary tomorrow. I honestly don’t know. I’m tired, it’s harder to sort out where the edges are.”

“I suppose it doesn’t matter,” Hannibal said, slightly shaken. It was hardly as if he hadn't known about Will’s ability, but he rarely saw it so obviously demonstrated in such a casual way, as if forgetting where Will ended and where Hannibal began was something that happened to Will so frequently he forgot it was unusual. He sat next to Will on the bed, looking over his shoulder at the tablet. “That looks perfectly adequate.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

“Thank you for rearranging things,” Hannibal said, countering Will's sarcasm with his own sincerity. “I wasn’t planning to say anything about changing our plans for tomorrow, but I am glad they have changed.”

“You’re welcome.” He pressed the buttons to finish making the reservation at the hotel in Regina. “I’m going to shower; try not to murder anyone before I get back.”

“Will.” 

“Okay, okay. I just feel like I need to say it every once in awhile.” He grabbed a change of clothes out of his bag and headed into the bathroom.

Hannibal plugged in the tablet, and his phone. He checked that the privacy lock on the door was engaged and turned off the lights in the kitchen and sitting area before sliding into bed. He left the lamp on Will’s side of the bed on, but turned off his own. He’d brought a book to read, but that kind of focus seemed beyond him. Instead, he drew the covers over his shoulders and was asleep well before Will came out of the bathroom. 


	3. Day two (Winnipeg to Regina)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter finally gets to that "explicit" rating! I don't know that it's actually a terribly explicit sex scene but it's there. Yay!

When Hannibal opened his eyes it was dark in the room. He reached out for Will but found the sheets cold and...damp? Sweat. He sat up, scanning the darkness. The couch had been pulled out into a bed, and there was a dark lump on it that had to be Will. Hannibal sighed. If he hadn’t severely damaged his abdominal muscles, he would simply carry Will back to bed; as it was, his only choice was to go to him. He grabbed his pillow and the blanket and settled down next to Will where he lay, uncovered, on the uncomfortable folding mattress. Hannibal pulled the blanket up over both of them and drew Will close with an arm around his waist. Despite the uneven support, he was asleep again in minutes.

The next time he woke it was because Will was trying to wriggle out of his embrace, and still not fully awake, his response was simply to drag him closer again. 

“I have to piss, I’ll be right back,” Will said. Hannibal grudgingly released him.

By the time Will returned, Hannibal was significantly more awake, although still pleased to have Will curl up against him. “What time is it?”

“Almost seven.” Will sighed. He reached up with one hand to touch Hannibal’s cheek. “You were supposed to stay in the comfortable bed. It sort of defeats the purpose of me coming over here to make you more comfortable if you come over here too.”

“I would rather lie with you on the hard ground than alone on the most comfortable bed,” Hannibal said honestly.

“Okay,” Will said. “It’s too early for me to deal with that. But. We probably should set some ground rules, because this is going to happen again.”

“I don’t mind that you have nightmares. Sometimes I have nightmares, and while they may not be as incapacitating as yours, they can still make sharing a bed with me uncomfortable. Would you prefer I left you alone? In truth, I would rather change the sheets and have you back in bed with me.”

“Molly and I had a spare bedroom that I used when it got bad. I didn’t mind when she followed me in there, but usually she didn’t.” Will took his hand back, holding it close to his chest.

“If what you want is a retreat, I will respect that.”

“No, that’s not—I never minded when she came in. It’s nice, really, to not be alone. It was nice to wake up with you there this morning. I just don’t want to put you out. I don't want to have to feel guilty on top of gross and terrified.”

“You needn't feel guilty for letting me take care of you. I enjoy it. I want you to be able to rely on me.”

“Because you're a possessive son of a bitch.” Will sighed. “Fine. When we get everything set up at the house, if you want to get up at three am and change the sheets, be my guest. Until then, I'm going to move to the nearest flat surface that isn't soaked in sweat and go back to sleep, and you can join me if you want to.”

“And you won't feel guilty about it?”

Will shrugged. “I'll try not to.”

“That's all I ask.” Hannibal smiled. “How do you feel this morning, aside from the guilt?”

“Sore. Glad we only have to drive six hours today.”

“If we intended to drive thirteen, we'd need to have already left.”

“Part of why I'm glad we only have to do six. We should probably get up soon, though. I'd rather get in earlier and have more time to settle in and make dinner then hang around here, since we're awake anyway.”

“Reasonable. I still have to prepare food for us to eat on the road, as well.” Hannibal sighed.

“Did you just...sigh? Over having to cook?”

Hannibal swatted him in the leg. “I sighed because once again, I have you in my bed, and yet I still can't do anything about it.”

“Oh. Soon, I promise.” Will leaned in and kissed him quickly, just a press of lips. 

“You are driving me crazy.”

“I know,” Will said, sitting up. “Come on, let’s get going, we’ve got another long day ahead of us.”

Hannibal sighed again, but got out of bed. Will packed up everything while Hannibal made breakfast (with mediocre bread and ham, but their options had been limited). They ate together, and then Hannibal prepared their lunch while Will loaded the rest of the things into the car. They were ready to go before nine.

“Are you okay?” Will asked about forty-five minutes in. 

“Should I not be?” Hannibal took his eyes off the road to give Will an inquiring look.

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you be so quiet for so long.” They hadn’t really spoken since they left the hotel. “I thought I’d check.”

“I am in pain, and quite tired, but not to an extent you need to worry,” Hannibal admitted. 

“Yeah, I guess sleeping on the couch wasn’t great for either of us.” Will sighed heavily. “You really didn’t need to follow me.”

“I don’t regret it.” Hannibal sighed, adjusting his grip on the wheel. “I doubt the uncomfortable mattress had much of an effect on my injury, although the long hours in the car certainly did.”

“Are you sure you want to keep driving? I could probably make the whole thing today, you could lie down in the backseat.”

“You worry too much, Will.” Hannibal shook his head fondly.

“You’ve told me that before.” Will smiled. “I think you’re just not used to people being concerned about you.”

“Perhaps. Nevertheless, I know my own limits. I’d rather not make you do all the driving—it does us no more good to have you exhausted than me.”

“Just—let me know if you need to take a break. You look kind of pale.”

Hannibal was feeling worse this morning than he had been, but it was still manageable. He’d wanted to drive in the morning so he would have more energy to cook that night, but he was not longer sure that had been a good plan. Perhaps he would take a page out of Will’s book and nap in the afternoon. Hopefully this fatigue would pass soon. “I will, don’t worry.”

Will looked out the window for a while, head rested in one hand. “I hate travelling like this.”

“Oh?”

“Just going on, day after day. You get tired and it just—stays. At least the lakes and things yesterday were interesting to look at.” The landscape had flattened out into endless fields with the occasional stand of oak trees. “This is too homogenous.”

“I’m sorry the scenery isn’t to your liking.”

Will laughed. “You apologize about the scenery, but not any of the things that are actually your fault?”

“I wish I could change the scenery.”

“Do you ever…?” Will shook his head and let the question trail off.

“Ask, Will.” Hannibal said firmly.

Will sighed. “Do you ever think about if things had been different? If we’d just—if she’d lived. If we could have had our family.”

“Frequently.” Hannibal sighed, too tired to be anything but honest. “It was something I often imagined when I was incarcerated. That the three of us were together.”

“Do you think it was ever really possible?”

“I don’t know,” Hannibal admitted. “I know there was a time when I thought it was.”

“I wish I had. I wish I had realized sooner that this was what I wanted.” Will’s voice cracked, and Hannibal looked over to see tears glistening on his cheeks. “I wish she was still alive.”

“Will…” Hannibal reached out, and then put his hand back on the steering wheel, gripping it tightly. Will’s anger was easier to deal with than his sadness.

“Oh, god, I’m sorry.” Will scrubbed at his eyes, letting out a sound that was more sob than laugh. “I’m just so fucking tired, Hannibal. I just—every time, every time I have something good, something that makes me happy you just—” he broke off in another sob. “And I’m too tired to even be angry about it anymore, you know? I can’t. It hurts to be angry at you. It _hurts_. But you just keep…” He shook his head, tears still rolling down his cheeks. 

Hannibal wasn’t sure what to do. He was too tired himself to be able to find the words to explain to Will the logic behind his decisions, to find the words to make it hurt less. He pulled over onto the shoulder and stopped the car, flicking on the hazard lights as he turned to look at his friend, this man that he loved with all the broken pieces of himself. “Will, I…”

“No, okay, shut up. Sorry, I just…” He rubbed at his eyes almost angrily. “Just drive, okay, I’m fine, I’m just a mess right now.” He took a deep breath, and when he lowered his hands the tears had slowed. “You know what my nightmare was about last night?”

“No,” Hannibal said carefully, making no move to start the car. “Although I wondered if it were about me.”

“It wasn’t.” Will let out a breath. “I dreamed that I killed them. Molly and Wally and Abigail and Bev. They were standing around me, bleeding out, and pointing at me, telling me that I did this to them, that this was my fault. And I did, I did do this to them, it is my fault.”

“No, Will.” Hannibal grabbed Will’s hand and held it tightly when he tried to pull away. “No. You are not responsible for my actions, now or in the past. You cannot let this guilt swallow you. It is not yours to bear.”

“Is it not my fault for falling in love with a monster?”

“Falling in love is outside of your control. You are no more at fault for loving me than for preferring coffee over tea.” Hannibal stroked his thumb over Will’s hand. “In the end, it is my love for you that has given you the most trouble.”

Will blinked slowly, relaxing his hand in Hannibal’s. “I’m not giving that up.”

“You couldn’t, even if you wanted to.” Hannibal reached up his free hand to cup Will’s face and wipe the last of the tears away with his thumb. “I am as inevitably, irrevocably bound by this as you are.”

“I know.” Will leaned into his hand. “And I know you feel almost as violated by it as I do.”

“Violated. Is that what this makes you feel?” He squeezed Will’s hand, leaning closer.

“No,” Will said, meeting Hannibal's eyes. “It makes me feel _alive_.” 

Hannibal closed the gap between them, gently pulling Will forward into a kiss. Will gasped, pressing forward into the contact and bringing his free hand around behind Hannibal’s head to pull him closer.

“You have no idea what you do to me,” Hannibal said into Will’s mouth, utterly unable to break away.

“I know _exactly_ what I do to you,” Will countered, nipping lightly at Hannibal’s lip. “I _see_ you.”

Hannibal let out a sharp sound, licking closer into Will’s mouth and deepening the kiss. Will sucked Hannibal’s upper lip between his own and bit down hard enough to hurt. Hannibal groaned, trying to tug Will closer but being blocked by the gearshift.

Breathless seconds later they finally separated, gasping. Will managed to speak first. “Wow.”

“I told you you were driving me crazy,” Hannibal said, licking his lips.

“I guess you did.” Will sat back in his seat, releasing Hannibal and straightening his shirt. “I need to cry more often.”

“I’d rather you didn’t.” Hannibal smiled. “It’s not a required prerequisite.”

Will snorted, face still flushed and pupils dilated.  “We, um, we should get going.”

“I suppose we should.” Hannibal gave him a lingering look before turning the car back on and pulling out onto the highway. 

“Well, you’ve got more color now, so that’s good,” Will said after a long pause.

Hannibal laughed. “I should hope so.”

“Sorry about, uh, freaking out on you. Before.”

“I’m sorry that you have been carrying such a burden.”

“But not sorry that you gave me cause for it.”

“I have some regrets.” Hannibal clenched his hands on the steering wheel. “In the case of the two that I killed, I could see no alternative at the time. We’ve already discussed your family.”

“You’re right.” Will sighed. “It’s silly for me to keep snapping at you for things neither of us can change.”

“It’s a method of processing that’s as valid as any other. The more you think about something, the more you understand; eventually, your brain will consider the facts fully analyzed and cease bringing them constantly to the forefront of your thoughts.”

“Yeah,” Will said in a sigh. “You sound more awake, are you feeling better?”

Hannibal shrugged. “It’s likely no more than adrenaline, but yes. Are you?”

“I guess so. My emotions are still kind of all over the place, but so are yours, so that’s not likely to get better any time soon.”

“As you pointed out, I am only human.”

“So am I.” Will rubbed his hands on his knees. “I hate this.”

“You’ve had a lot to deal with lately, it’s hardly surprising that you’re overwhelmed. Emotional upheaval combined with lowered defenses from pain and fatigue frequently leads to outbursts of uncontrollable feeling.”

“That doesn’t make me feel any less pathetic, but I appreciate the effort.” Will sighed. “Thank you for pulling over. You didn’t have to, but it was a nice gesture.”

“I want to be able to care for you,” Hannibal said. “That’s something I’ve wanted from the beginning.”

Will closed his eyes, and when he spoke his voice had a strange quality to it. “You brought me chicken soup. I was dying of encephalitis, and you knew, but instead of telling the doctors you made me chicken soup.” Will opened his eyes, blinking back into the present. “Afterwards, I thought that was just a manipulation. But it wasn’t, was it? You were trying to care for me, in your own way.”

“Yes. I will admit, the manipulative effects were something I took into consideration, but I did already care for you.”

“Huh.”

 

Hannibal drove for the rest of the morning, past fields and farmhouses. The flat, repetitive landscape and the straight road heading off into the horizon lulled him into a half-meditative state, and he drove more or less on autopilot as the sun climbed in the sky behind them.

“Have you ever been to Vancouver before?” Will asked, startling Hannibal into the present.

Hannibal jumped slightly, blinking as he turned to Will. “Sorry, what?”

“Have you ever been to the part of BC we’re moving to?”

“No. I haven’t spent much time on the west coast, nor in Canada.”

Will nodded. “Yeah, me neither. Went to a conference once in Seattle, but otherwise I don’t think I’ve ever been west of the Rockies.”

“It will be a new experience for both of us, I’m sure.”

“Yeah. I hear it rains a lot.”

“Yes. And also that it’s very beautiful.”

“Very, uh, green.” 

“Yes,” Hannibal agreed. “I understand that Vancouver has a thriving fine arts community.”

“That's good.” Will paused, drumming his fingers on the arm rest. “Sorry, I feel like talking but I don't know what to say.”

“Have you given any more thought to what you might want to do after we get settled?”

“You, apparently.”

Hannibal chuckled. “As a profession, Will.”

Will shook his head, grinning. “You don't think I could do you professionally? Sorry. No, I haven't really given it much thought.”

“There are bound to be opportunities, I suppose. You could always just fish, if that appealed to you.”

“I'd feel like I wasn't contributing. Unless I did commercial fishing, but you have to be away from home so much for that…”

“I'd have thought you'd appreciate the time away.”

There must have been something in Hannibal’s voice that betrayed an emotion, because Will was looking at him in concern. “Why would you think that? I finally get to have you to myself and you think I'm looking for a chance to leave?”

“I was unaware that ‘having me to yourself’ was something you wanted.” Hannibal failed to keep the bitterness out of his tone.

“Where is this coming from? Why do you think I'm doing this if I don't want to be with you?”

“You act as if you haven't spent this entire trip explaining why I can't compare to what you've left behind.” Hannibal felt himself getting angry and was too tired to fight it.

“That's not what I've been trying to do.” Will reached over and put a hand on Hannibal's knee. “I told you, I want to be here because I love you. I don't know how much more explicit I need to be.”

Hannibal clenched his hands on the steering wheel to prevent himself from slapping Will’s hand away. “Please take your hand off me,” he said as evenly as he could manage.

Will drew his hand back to his chest as quickly as if he’d been burned. He laced his hands together on his lap and held them tightly, still looking concerned.

Hannibal waited, feeling cold and tired and in pain and frustrated with himself. It became clear that Will wasn’t going to speak, and he let the silence settle, trying to get ahold of his emotions. “I’m sorry,” he said after some time had passed.

Will looked up at him. “Not like I haven’t been acting the same towards you this whole time. I didn’t even really think—I’m not used to thinking of you as vulnerable.”

“I overreacted.” _I should have better control over myself_.

“You’re tired, and sick.”

“Injured.”

“In this instance, I’d say they were the same.” Will sighed. “Look, it’s after noon. We need gas, we need to eat. Let’s stop at the next town and I’ll drive the rest of the way and you can take a nap.”

Hannibal wanted to protest that he knew how to take care of himself, but perhaps it was for the best. He simply nodded, and then turned into the next gas station they came across.

They ate the lunch he had packed them in the car; it was too cold still to sit outside. By the time they got on the road again, Hannibal was feeling slightly better, though still tired.

“We should be there in less than three hours,” Will said as he pulled back onto the highway. “Go to sleep, I’ll wake you up when we’re close.”

“Thank you.”

Will waved a hand at him. “It’s nothing. Rest. I’ve been looking forward to having a dinner you actually have time to prepare, so I need you to be in good shape by the time we get there.”

Hannibal chuckled and shook his head, leaning against the window. He watched the fields rolling by outside the window, letting the gentle motion of the car lull him to sleep.

He woke up to a hand on his shoulder and Will softly saying his name. Hannibal blinked, sitting up straighter and stifling a yawn.

“Sorry,” Will said. “But we’ve passed at least six billboards talking about how it’s illegal to use your phone and drive in Saskatchewan and I have no idea how to get where we’re going.”

Hannibal blinked again. They must have been in Regina, there was a city outside the windows, and Will wanted directions. He pulled out his phone and looked up the hotel. “Take a left toward ‘Moose Jaw’ in one kilometer.”

“Thanks,” Will said, switching lanes. “How are you feeling?”

Hannibal took a second to consider that. “Better, I think.”

“Good.”

“And you?”

“I’m okay.” Will shrugged. “Not worse, anyway. I’ll be glad to get off the road.”

“Yes.” Hannibal sighed. “How long did I sleep?”

“More than two hours. It’s after four.”

Hannibal nodded. “This is the turn.”

“Thanks. Where do I need to be next?”

“Stay on this road for 8 kilometers. It’s exit 80.” 

Will nodded and got into the left lane. 

“Did we pass anything interesting while I was sleeping?”

“Not really. A whole lot of grass, mostly.”

“And signs warning against the use of cell phones?”

Will laughed. “Yeah. You know, whenever we cross into a new province there’s a bunch of signs talking about which rules are stricter.”

“Any others I should be aware of?”

“None that I can think of.” Will shrugged. “It wasn’t exactly exciting.”

“Then I’m not sorry to have been asleep.”

They made it to the hotel without difficulty, and as before, Hannibal went to check in while Will gathered their luggage.

“Are you checking in, sir?” The front desk clerk asked. She was a young white woman, with dyed blonde hair and a name tag that said “Mary.”

“Yes, there should be a reservation under the name Gagnon?”

She tapped at the keyboard. “I’m sorry, sir, I don’t see anything under the name ‘Ganyaw’. Are you sure it was at this hotel?”

“Gagnon,” he corrected, and spelled it for her. “You don’t see it?”

“Oh, sorry. Yeah, I’ve got Gag-none, Henry, for the Science Room.”

“My name is Henri Gagnon,” Hannibal said. “And it should be a suite. I specifically booked a room with a kitchen.”

“That’s not what it says here, Mr. Gag-none.”

Hannibal gritted his teeth and forced a polite smile. “Is there a room with a kitchen that’s available?”

“I don’t have one cleaned, no. I can get housekeeping up there, but it might be a couple hours.”

“Is there any way that can be expedited?”

“No sir, I can’t throw off the schedule. The rooms we have reservations for get cleaned first, and then she goes and does the rest in order. Seeing as you didn’t have a reservation, you’re going to have to wait.”

“Is there a problem?” Will asked, coming up behind Hannibal.

“There seems to be a mistake with our room,” Hannibal told him.

“No, sir,” Mary said. “As I was just saying, sir, you made a reservation for the Science room. Now that room’s in real high demand, we could have put somebody else in it tonight. I’m happy to upgrade you to the suite you’re asking about, but you’ll have to wait for it to get cleaned.”

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” Will said. “But we did book the suite specifically, and we’ve been on the road all day. Are you sure there’s nothing you can do?” He pulled up the reservation on his phone and showed her where it clearly said “King Suite”.

“It’ll be ready when it’s ready,” she said brusquely. “Come back after five and we’ll see what we can do.”

Hannibal nodded sharply and grabbed Will’s elbow to lead him out of the lobby.

“Oh my god,” Will said once they were outside. “Was she like that the whole time?”

“Worse,” Hannibal said. “She kept calling me Mr. Gag-none.”

“It is kind of hard to pronounce.”

“Not if you speak French, which is considered a primary language in this country.” They got to the car and Hannibal slid into the driver’s seat. “What shall we do with this spare hour?”

“I was really looking forward to lying down in a bed.” Will sighed, buckling his seatbelt. “I guess we could take the opportunity to get groceries.”

“That would be productive.” Hannibal allowed himself one deep breath. It would be horribly impractical to kill the young woman now, and they were unlikely to ever be in this area again. The anger wasn’t worth holding on to. “Will you direct me?”

The grocery store they found had a fairly decent selection, and provided they actually got a room with a kitchen Hannibal had high hopes for the evening meal.

When they returned to the hotel, the front desk was unmanned, a small sign on it that said “Back in 15 minutes”.  They sat on the bench against the wall with their luggage and waited. Twenty minutes later Mary returned, trailed by a fluffy white dog on a leash.

“Oh,” she said. “You guys again.”

“You told us to come back at five,” Hannibal said, looking pointedly at the clock that said 5:30.

“Let me just put Fluffy in the office and I'll see if your room is ready.” She didn’t wait for a response, just headed behind the counter and through a door, closing it firmly behind her.

They gathered their belongings and went to stand at the counter. It was almost five minutes before she emerged.

“So, what was your name, again?”

“Gagnon, Ben and Henri Gagnon,” Will said quickly.

“That’s right, Gag-none. Looks like it’s about done. Just let me grab you guys the keys.” She turned around and went back into the office. Will looked up at Hannibal and rolled his eyes dramatically. “Here you all go, king suite with a pull out couch for your brother here.”

“My _husband_ and I appreciate your help with the mix-up,” Will said.

She at least had the grace to look flustered. “Enjoy your stay.”

Will waited until they were in the elevator to go off. “Can you _believe_ her? Okay, the dog has to go for a walk, but she didn’t even apologize! And _brothers_. After we’d asked her for a king suite? Do I look like your _brother_? And who the fuck names their dog ‘Fluffy’?”

“Apparently, she does.” Hannibal was almost as upset as Will was, but controlling it better. “And no, you do not look like my brother.”

“I know we’re not exactly in the big city anymore, but _God._ I didn’t think we’d get any grief about this in _Canada_.”

“Perhaps this country is not as idyllic as your fellow Americans would have us believe.”

“Or maybe she’s just an asshole.” 

They got out of the elevator and went to the room, which was thankfully clean and the proper layout.

“At least it’s a nice room?” Will said uncertainly. It was big, with a full kitchen and a separate living room and bedroom. 

“It was a good choice of hotel, excepting their staffing choice.”

“Unfortunately hard to see that online.” Will started putting away groceries, and Hannibal moved to help.

“I’m sorry today hasn’t lived up to expectations.”

“It’s just been an emotional day, I guess.” Will shrugged. “We’ll be gone tomorrow, I guess one inconvenient hour wasn’t the end of the world.”

“It ate up a lot of the afternoon we had planned to spend together,” Hannibal said. He would have to start cooking within an hour, and while he was pleased to do it, he’d hoped to have some time to spend with Will first. They still hadn’t discussed their kiss that morning, for one thing; now that they were alone and out of the car it had come to the forefront of his mind.

“Oh? Did you have plans?” Will said, straightening and turning to look at him.

“Yes,” he heard himself say, though he hadn’t intended to. He’d meant to let Will take his time, but he found himself walking forward, pinning Will between his body and the counter. He stopped just short of touching, placing one hand on either side of Will. “I did.”

Will licked his lips. “Would you like to share?”

Instead of answering, Hannibal leaned forward to kiss him. Will gasped, arms coming up around Hannibal and drawing him closer until they were pressed together, chest to chest. Hannibal took one hand off the counter and brought it up to cup the back of Will’s head, holding him there so he could press closer with his mouth, wet and open against Will’s. The kiss was just on the right side of too rough, teeth and tongues and an edge of anger and desperation that made Hannibal want more, want to press and press until he wasn’t sure where he ended and Will began. Will turned his head, gasping, but Hannibal couldn’t separate even that far; he kissed Will’s cheek, bending to lick under his ear and mouth at the side of his neck. He was rewarded by a needy gasp and Will’s hand tugging at his hair.

“Hannibal,” Will started, and then broke off in an inarticulate noise. 

“Will,” Hannibal murmured into his skin, kissing back up to his mouth. He pressed a series of soft, quick kisses against Will’s lips before pulling back to meet his eyes.

“Jesus Christ,” Will gasped. 

“Does that answer your question?” Hannibal asked, pleased that his voice came out even, if a bit lower than normal.

“Yeah,” Will breathed, eyes flicking down to his lips. “I’d say it does.”

Hannibal stepped away from him, walking to the refrigerator. “Pity there’s no time for that now.”

“You _motherfucker,_ ” Will said emphatically, still leaning against the counter, arousal obvious against the cant of his hips.

Hannibal turned to smirk at him. “You said you were looking forward to dinner.”

Will rubbed a hand over his face. “I cannot believe you.”

“You don’t want dinner?” Hannibal asked, widening his eyes is a show of false hurt.

“Don’t give me that,” Will said. “You knew exactly what you were doing.”

“I thought we could both use the distraction,” Hannibal said, reaching around Will to get a pan and then speaking close to his ear, “and you are very kissable.”

Will shivered as Hannibal moved away. “Do you want any help with dinner?”

Hannibal grinned and directed him to prepare some vegetables.

They prepared dinner together, their bodies in tune even when their minds weren’t. Will seemed to have moved past his frustration with Mary at the desk, and Hannibal was content to let it go and enjoy himself. It had been a trying day, but now that they were in a position to stop and simply be, Hannibal could hardly remember where his frustration had been coming from. Will, his beautiful, wonderful Will, was here with him, cooking with him, letting him kiss him. And it was going to stay this way indefinitely. What reason could he possibly have to be angry?

They’d bought a bottle of wine to have with dinner, and the last two glasses were in their hands as they sat at the table. The plates had been cleared a while ago, and at this point they were simply talking.

“So then Becca—big, fluffy, you never met her—just runs into the stream and bites at something,” Will was saying. “And even though we've been there all day and nothing, she comes up with this twenty pound fish flopping around in her mouth. It smacks Wally in the face when he tries to get it from her, and then of course she shakes—and like I said, she's got a _lot_ of fur—so we both get soaked, Wally’s covered in mud, and the dog got a better catch than we did. Molly laughed at us for days.”

Hannibal smiled, sipping at his wine. “I'm sure she did.” He was glad that Will was sharing with him even these lighthearted stories about his family, but it was still difficult to listen to Will talk about his happiness with someone else. “He sounds like a good boy.”

“Most of the time, yeah.” Will smiled. “Molly did a good job.”

“Would you ever want to try again?”

Will laughed without humor. “I think that would be a bad idea.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because the last, oh, three times I've tried to be a parent you have killed, gotten killed, or tried to kill my child?” Will set his empty glass down. “I trust you, to a certain extent, with my own life. But I'm not interested in getting attached to some innocent child just to have you take them away. Again.”

“I do like having you to myself.”

“That's pretty unhealthy. For both of us.”

“I know.” Hannibal sighed. 

“Everything that can happen, happens. Somewhere out there, there's a universe where we get to have a family. It's not this one.”

“You're probably right.” Hannibal sighed again, staring at the wine in his glass. “I'm sorry.”

“I don't know if I believe you, but okay. I mean, you’re forgiven anyway. But there’s a difference between forgiving you for doing something and being okay with you doing it again.”

“I know.”

“I love you,” Will said after a pause. “I want you all to myself too.”

“Do you really?” Hannibal looked up, into Will’s eyes.

“Yeah,” Will smiled. “I just know that that’s impractical.”

Hannibal felt something loosen slightly in the tangled knot of emotions in his chest. He set down his glass, reaching out to take Will’s hand in his. “A caged thing is never so beautiful as when it’s set free.”

“We’ve both been in cages,” Will said, nodding. “And I think neither of us is eager to go back.”

“No,” Hannibal agreed. “Although I will admit there is a certain appeal to keeping you somewhere, shut away from the rest of the world.”

“I know.” Will squeezed his hand. “But there’s something more meaningful about trusting you not to leave, when I know you could.”

“Yes.” Hannibal stood, drawing Will to him with the hand he still held. He raised his free hand to the side of Will’s face, gently tracing his cheek. “May I kiss you?”

Will nodded, leaning in and meeting Hannibal halfway, wrapping his free arm around behind Hannibal’s back to pull him closer, crushing their lips together. It was too hard, too quick, too eager, and their teeth clicked together as Will pressed closer, licking into Hannibal’s mouth like he was trying to get inside his skin. Hannibal slid his hand off Will’s face, caressing his neck and stroking down his back to cup his ass and bring their hips together. He could feel Will getting hard against his thigh and was well on his way there himself as Will bit down on his lower lip, clutching at him desperately and making a soft needy noise. Hannibal pushed forward, walking Will backwards until his knees hit the bed and then crawling on top of him. 

“Will,” he breathed into Will’s mouth, braced over him on the bed. He bent to press a kiss under Will’s ear, licking the skin there and making him squirm.

“God, Hannibal, _please_.” Will thrust up against him, still fully clothed and much too separate. Hannibal got one hand between them and started working on the buttons of Will’s shirt, kissing him as he shoved the shirt off his shoulders. 

They had to separate for a second to pull Will’s undershirt over his head, and Will took the opportunity to get his hands under Hannibal’s sweater, sliding it up and off as well. They stared at each other for a second, Hannibal taking in the still-healing wound on Will’s shoulder and the old scar on his abdomen as Will stared at him. Will was beautiful, cracked but repaired with gold, a kintsukuroi for the ages. 

Caught by the desire to touch, to possess, to be closer, Hannibal kissed him hungrily, letting the press of their lips say the praises he knew Will would not accept aloud. Will clutched him closer, kissing fiercely, teeth biting into Hannibal’s lower lip. The claim in that kiss sent a spike of arousal all through him, and Hannibal bucked against Will, grinding their cocks together through their clothes.

One of Will’s hands found its way to Hannibal’s belt, making quick work of the fastenings on his pants, and Hannibal let out a groan as Will shoved them down and freed his cock. He kicked them off the rest of the way, getting to work on Will’s fly, undressing him quickly. 

The feeling of pressing against Will fully naked, nothing between them, was as intoxicating as it was overwhelming. The raw noise it pulled out of Will’s throat was enough to make Hannibal’s cock jerk, and he kissed Will desperately, feeling welling up in him. He got his hand between them and closed it around their cocks.

“Yessss,” Will hissed, clutching at Hannibal’s back. “Touch me, claim me.”

“The things I want to do to you,” Hannibal said breathlessly. “I want to make you _mine_.”

“I’m yours,” Will breathed against his mouth, shaking underneath him. “Always yours.”

They were moving quickly against each other and Hannibal knew this wouldn’t last long; there would be time for more elaborate lovemaking, time to take each other apart physically the way they already had mentally, but for now he focused on kissing Will—his mouth, his neck, anywhere within reach. He could feel himself getting closer and tightened his grip on them, sweat not enough of a lubricant to keep it from being a little too rough but god if he was going to stop now.

Will choked on a sob as he came, spilling his release between their chests, and the sight of his face was enough to send Hannibal tipping over that edge after him. He collapsed next to Will, panting.

“Well,” Will said a few minutes later, still a little breathless, “that was…”

“It was,” Hannibal agreed. “I love you.”

Will shifted against him, turning to bury his face in Hannibal’s chest. “I love you too.”

Hannibal brought an arm up around Will, holding him close. They needed to shower, but that could wait a few more minutes.


	4. Day Three (Regina to Calgary)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is v long so i hope that can tide you guys over for a bit while i work on chapters five and six! there probably won't be a chapter next week

Hannibal woke up feeling refreshed. Alcohol and exhaustion had let him get a solid night of rest, and the comfortable bed had done wonders for his back. He stretched, and then rolled over to wrap an arm around Will’s waist, pressing a kiss to the back of his neck. Will stirred, turning in his embrace as his ocean eyes opened.

“Good morning,” Hannibal said.

“Hey,” Will said sleepily, and then blinked himself more awake. “I got you something last night.”

Hannibal’s confused response was cut off by the yip of a small dog.

“I also, uh, got me something last night.”

“Will,” Hannibal said slowly, suddenly very awake. “Is there a dog in this hotel room?”

“Possibly?” Will said, putting a hand on Hannibal’s leg as Hannibal went to get up and arresting him in a sitting position. “Don’t freak out, okay, I talked to the front desk about it, we’re fine. They think we’ve had the dog the whole time.”

Hannibal looked at the dog. It looked remarkably like the one the rude concierge had had last night. “Why do we have Fluffy in our hotel room?”

“We are not calling him Fluffy, I am not having a dog named Fluffy.” Will said, getting out of the bed. “As for why we have him, well, that bring us back to what I got for you.”

Hannibal followed him, curious, and when Will opened the refrigerator he felt his heart stop. Neatly wrapped organs were laid out on the shelf, kidneys, liver, heart. Human, or a very clever facsimile thereof. “ _Will,_ ” he breathed when he could speak. 

Will grinned at him. “I thought you’d like it.”

Hannibal pulled him into a hard kiss, utterly unable to contain the swell of ecstatic joy he felt. “Will,” he said again.

Will laughed against his lips, shoving him back until he could speak. Hannibal simply leaned down and kissed the hollow of his throat as Will explained, “I went down to get sheets for the couch and I saw her kicking her dog and I thought, ‘Why the hell not?’.”

Hannibal leaned back to look at him, though he left his hands where they were on the small of Will’s back. “I assume you took the proper precautions?”

“I did do this for a living. She doesn’t work again until Saturday, lives alone so no one is likely to notice she’s missing until then. The hotel thinks we’ve always had a pomeranian—the woman last night was very helpful and forthcoming with all of this, especially after I told her how _helpful_ Mary had been earlier. There’s nothing of me at her house, and the body is at the bottom of Wascana Lake.”

Hannibal marveled at him, unable to keep a happy smile from tugging at his lips. “I love you.”

Will grinned back. “We’ll see if you’re still saying that after sixteen hours in a car with a little dog.”

“You _would_ kill a woman for being cruel to her animal.”

“Not only for being cruel to her animal.” He poked Hannibal in the chest. “It turns out I’m pretty possessive myself. It was the dog that tipped me over the edge, yeah, but if you’d suggested it after she called you my brother I certainly wouldn’t have protested.”

“I’ll bear that in mind.” He kissed Will again, gentle and chaste. “Thank you. It’s an excellent gift.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t present it properly,” Will said cheekily, “but we are trying to stay under the radar here.”

Hannibal hugged him closer, peppering kisses against his mouth, his cheeks, his nose.

Will started laughing and shoved him away. “I appreciate your enthusiasm, but we probably should get going. We’ll need to stop somewhere and get supplies for the dog.”

Hannibal nodded, still smiling as he went back into the bedroom to get dressed for the day. “You haven’t given him a name yet?”

“All I know is I’m not calling him Fluffy.” Will followed him into the room, pulling out his own clothes.

Hannibal considered that. “Are you open to suggestions?”

“You can name him if you want. He is our first dog together, after all.”

The dog was sitting on the end of the bed, glaring at both of them. It probably wondered why it had yet to be fed. It was a small, aristocratic thing, a white poof of fur with a haughty face. It looked at him and made a sharp yipping sound, and he had to stop himself from flinching. “Asclepius,” he said.

“Bless you?”

Hannibal smirked. “For the dog’s name. The greek god of medicine, Asclepius.”

“I did say you could name him. It’s better than Fluffy, at least.” Will crossed to the bed, sitting next to the little dog and scratching behind its ear. It closed its eyes happily. “What do you think?” he addressed the animal. “Do you want to be called Asclepius?” The dog yipped at him. “He says it sounds pretentious as fuck, but acceptable.”

Hannibal laughed. “It’s nice to see you in such high spirits.”

“And you.” 

“If I prepared deviled kidneys for breakfast, would you also consider that ‘pretentious as fuck’?”

Will snorted, which was the desired reaction. “Everything you cook is pretentious as fuck. Doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate it. And I did go to all the trouble of getting you _gourmet_ ingredients.”

Hannibal did end up making the kidneys for breakfast, and then they went to the store to get ingredients for lunch and food for the dog. Will insisted on preparing the dog food himself, and then on stopping at a pet store to pick up other supplies before they left, so it was nearly ten before they managed to get on the road.

“You look awfully pleased with yourself,” Will said as Hannibal drove out of town.

“Should I not? I am a man who has rather abruptly been handed everything he’s wanted.”

Will smiled, shaking his head. “I won’t pretend I’m surprised.”

“No. You knew very well what the results of your actions would be, and acted in an effort to get the reaction you desired.”

“Are you calling me manipulative?” He widened his eyes.

“I can be more explicit if I need to,” Hannibal said, smiling

Will laughed. “You’re worse. On a scale from one to ‘murdering your daughter’, I’d call rescuing this dog from an abusive owner about a three.”

Hannibal inclined his head in acknowledgement. “Fair.” He paused, not wanting to shatter the jovial quality of the morning, but wanting very much to know. “How did it feel?”

“Good.” Will took a breath. “Exhilarating. I’ve never pretended I didn’t like it.”

“Not, at least, to me,” Hannibal said, nodding. “I’m glad. As I said, I want you to be happy in this new life.”

“So far, I am.” Will smiled, resting a hand on Hannibal’s thigh. “Last night was good—I mean, obviously. I meant, it was good for us to have that release of tension. Oh, god. I mean, it was good for me to—you know what, this is not getting any better, is it?”

Hannibal laughed. “Regardless, I agree. The conscious decision to indulge in behaviors considered taboo was cathartic. For both of us.”

“Are you talking about the sex or the murder?”

“Why not both? I’d say both have affected your mood in a positive way.”

“Yours, too.”

“Most assuredly. What was it you said before? ‘I can’t begin to explain what it’s like to know you want all of me.’ It’s a heady feeling.”

“Killing is a heady feeling,” Will said.

“But not sex?”

“No, it’s pretty heady too. But I think that’s a _bit_ more normal.”

“Would it shock you if I said that I find the thought of you taking that woman’s life more stimulating than the physical connection we shared last night?”

“It probably should.”

“Which implies that it doesn’t.”

“I might be past the point of being able to be shocked by you.”

Hannibal grinned. “Fair enough.”

“Were you shocked?”

“I don’t know that I would say ‘shocked’. It implies an element of displeasure. I was certainly surprised, but pleasantly so.”

“I think I got that from the way you pounced on me.”

“You were very attractive.”

“I was channeling you.”

“I find myself quite attractive, then,” Hannibal said, smiling.

Will let out a burst of laughter. “Naw, you like me better.”

Hannibal’s smile softened. “I like the way I look on you,” he said, too honest. “I like seeing myself so far into your head. An indelible mark on your soul.”

“You’re lucky I’m nearly as possessive as you, talking like that.”

“I am a very fortunate man.” Hannibal took one hand off the wheel and covered Will’s where it still rested on his thigh.

“Yeah,” Will said on a sigh. “You really are.”

“I know,” Hannibal said soberly. “That we should have met at all was a miracle—that you would willingly come back to me at all, much less to the extent that you have, is beyond that.”

“That we’re even both alive is a miracle,” Will said darkly. “It comes down to chance and fate at so many points.”

“If you had survived that fall, and I had not, what would you have done?”

“I don’t know,” Will said. “It never crossed my mind.”

“Would you have gone back to your wife?”

“No,” Will said, and it clearly cost him something to admit it. “I might have tried, but it wouldn’t have lasted. Even if we both tried. There’s only so much strain a relationship can bear before it breaks. I wonder, if you had died, if I might have become you.”

“To a greater extent than you have?”

“Completely.” Will took a breath, looking over at Hannibal. “I’m not becoming you, I’m becoming a different version of myself, through you. There’s a difference.”

“I’m pleased that you see it.”

“What would you have done? If I’d died, and you’d lived?”

“Are you sure you want to know?”

“You asked me.”

Hannibal nodded, gripping the steering wheel with both hands. “I would have killed all of them, starting with your son. I’d leave Jack for last, so he could see the results of his failure.”

“And then?” Will’s voice was steady, his hand firm and present on Hannibal’s thigh.

Hannibal tightened his grip on the wheel, looking straight ahead. “And then, I suspect I would have gone back to that cliff and thrown myself off again until I got it right.”

Will squeezed Hannibal’s thigh slightly, and his eyes were burning the side of Hannibal’s face as he continued to stare fixedly at the road. “What happened to ‘suicide is the enemy’?”

“I told you there are things even I cannot bear.” He sighed, and let a little of the tension drain out of his hands. “Perhaps I would have chosen to continue my existence. But I would not have lived.” He covered Will’s hand with his own again. “I am grateful every day that neither of us had to face that eventuality.”

“Yes,” Will said, turning his hand up and holding Hannibal’s tightly. “Me too.”

 

There were more lakes interrupting the fields today, water that meshed with the grass at the edges to form strange hybrid wetlands that stretched on both sides of the road. It started raining softly, drumming on the roof as water smeared on the windshield. The dog put its paws on the window and barked at the raindrops. Will made a sharp sound and it laid back down. Peace settled over the car, surprising after days of turmoil.

“When I was a kid I wanted to be a veterinarian,” Will said eventually. “But I realized I like animals too much to watch them suffer like that.”

“There are other ways to work with animals.”

“I know. But I get so attached—I volunteered at the Humane Society once and came home with two new dogs.”

Hannibal shook his head. “Not that, then. There is a limit to the number of animals we can have.”

“That probably depends on how much land we have. I wonder how hard it is to get a kennel license in BC?”

“I meant a personal limit.”

“Yeah?” Will raised his eyebrows. “Are you really going to stop me if I bring a dog home?”

Hannibal sighed. “Probably not.”

“You did okay with the seven I had back in Wolf Trap.”

“I didn’t actually live with you back in Wolf Trap.”

“I guess.” Will sighed. “I’ll try to keep it under five, at least at first.”

“I suppose I can handle that.”

“You can’t say you didn’t know what you were getting into, with me.”

“No.” Hannibal smiled. “Your love of animals is as much a part of you as any of your other traits. As an aspect of you, I love it. Practically, I feel some parameters should be established.”

“So you wouldn’t mind if I established some parameters for you?”

“Reciprocity is only fair.”

“Then no kids—”

“—I told you—”

Will squeezed his leg, hard. “No. Kids. And no one I know, unless you discuss it with me first. Talk to me about anyone I would even recognize. And I’d rather it was only people who’d done something wrong, but I’m not going to police your definition of that.”

“I would stop, if you asked me to,” Hannibal said, though he’d hadn’t known it was true until the words came out of his mouth. He didn’t want to, but he would.

“I wouldn’t ask that of you. You would be a different person, and I don’t know if I could stand to be the one who broke you like that.”

“Is it breaking me, if I offer?”

“Forcing you to put yourself in a box for my comfort is no better for you than all the times people have tried to do that to me.”

Hannibal nodded, somewhat relieved. “Then I think that sounds like a reasonable compromise.”

“I know you know this, but don’t do anything stupid, okay? I know you love drama, but please don’t try to get caught again.”

“You ruin all my fun.” Hannibal laughed at Will’s exasperated look. “In all seriousness, I have no intention of getting caught again, at least so long as you are with me.”

“Good. Let me know if that changes, please.”

“What will you do if it does?” 

Will shrugged. “Get ready to move? Try to talk you down from whatever mental ledge you’ve gotten yourself on? Adopt out the dogs?”

“Kill me?”

“Probably not. I’m still pretty sure the only thing I’d kill you over now is if you threatened someone I really care about.”

“I’m no longer certain I could kill you,” Hannibal admitted. “I am certain that I don’t want to.”

“That’s good. I’d rather go into this marriage with a husband who didn’t want me dead than the alternative.”

“I love it when you call me your husband.”

“I know.” Will’s face was smug. “It’s a pity we didn’t get to have the ceremony. We don’t even have rings.” 

“I thought you didn’t like attention.”

“Mostly I’m sorry that I didn’t get to see whatever ridiculous thing you’d do for a wedding.”

Hannibal laughed. “I imagine we would have found a compromise.”

“Yeah,” Will agreed. “Molly’s and mine was pretty small. Simple. Just her family.”

“Who would we have invited? To our theoretical wedding.”

“If we’d done it before, back when we had friends that would come without trying to kill you, I guess I’d have wanted Alana and Jack? Chilton, to see his face. Bev and Jimmy and Z, of course. And Abigail, obviously. But I’ve always imagined you having a big wedding, lots of impersonal guests.”

“Have you imagined my wedding often?”

“Not really. Not to me anyway.”

“Who else did you imagine I would marry?”

“I may or may not have considered it when you were with Alana.” Will wrapped his arms around himself.

“And what was your role, at this wedding?”

“Waiting in the shadows to kill you.”

“To protect her?”

Will paused. When his spoke, his voice was a rough whisper. “Because if I couldn’t have you, no one could.”

Hannibal smiled, glancing over at Will’s defensive posture. “You’re lucky I’m as possessive as you, talking like that.”

That startled a laugh out of him, and he sat up, hands on his knees. “Don’t pretend you don’t like it.”

“And you don’t?”

“No, I do. I shouldn’t, but I do.”

“And why shouldn’t you?”

“Because it’s unhealthy? Come on, Doctor, you know this relationship is toxic. Codependence is inherently dysfunctional. And I’m _pretty_ sure the number of times we’ve tried to kill each other is a bad sign, but I’m not the one with the doctorate.”

“In some cases, a codependent relationship can be beneficial to both parties.”

“That’s shit psychology, but sure. I’m not going to argue with you about it. I’m not actually interested in changing anything.”

Hannibal sighed, shifting his grip on the wheel. “You’re right, of course. Objectively, we’re terrible for each other.”

“Nice to hear you admit it.” Will looked out the window, shaking his head slightly. “I do appreciate not being the craziest person in the relationship, though.”

“I’m not insane.”

“No, but you sure are something.” Will shook his head, turning back to look at him. “Sorry. I don’t mean that in a bad way, really.”

“Ah, calling me crazy is a compliment, I see.” 

Will laughed awkwardly. “You know what I mean.”

“Yes, I suppose I do.” Hannibal let the corner of his mouth quirk up in a smile.

“So,” Will said, changing the subject. “Are you going to get me a ring, husband?”

Hannibal let out a sharp laugh. “And they call me manipulative. Do you want one?”

“Yeah,” Will said without hesitation. “And I want you to have one too. I don’t want anyone to mistake us for _brothers_ again.”

Hannibal felt a curl of pleasure at the blatant possessiveness. “We can get something temporary in Calgary, perhaps. Long term, I’d like to get you something more unique than we could get out of a jewellery case.”

“I’m not wearing a giant diamond, if that’s where you’re going with this.”

Hannibal shook his head, amused. “I have no desire to feminize you. I was thinking an inscription, perhaps an inlay of some kind. Something to separate it from the ring you wore for your wife.”

“I...actually like the sound of that.”

“Do you have to sound so surprised?”

“Usually your aesthetic decisions don’t align very well with mine.”

“I do actually know you, Will. I’d choose something different for myself.”

“If you get to pick mine, I get to pick yours.”

“Do you have something in mind?”

Will nodded. “You’ll like it.”

Hannibal looked over at him. “You’re not going to tell me?”

“I think it’ll make a better surprise.”

“We don’t have a good history with surprises.”

Will laughed. “Fine, then describing it wouldn’t do it justice. You’ll have to wait and see.”

Hannibal was even more curious now, though he wasn’t sure if Will actually even had an idea or if he was just dragging this out to see Hannibal squirm. It would be like him. “I suppose I can be patient.”

“You waited for me for three years, I think you can wait another few weeks to get a ring.”

“As long as I have you with me in the meantime.”

“You’ve got me. Till death do us part.”

A slow smile spread across Hannibal’s face, and he took Will’s hand in his own. “Yes. And all that that implies.”

Will smiled back and squeezed his hand. “I love you.”

“And I, you.”

 

They stopped for lunch just after noon, and Will insisted that they take Asclepius to the dog park in the little town they’d found. Hannibal watched from the dry warmth of the car and Will chased the little dog through the rain, slipping and sliding on the wet grass. By the time they came back to the car, the dog had gone from a tiny white ball of fur to a tiny brown ball of mud.

Hannibal was already pulling a towel out of the trunk. He handed it to Will, holding his umbrella over both of them.

“Thanks,” Will said, taking it and rubbing at the dog’s fur.

“If you insist on taking the animal out in the rain, the least you can do is make sure it doesn’t ruin the inside of the car.”

“It’s not like you aren’t going to get a new car as soon as we’re settled. You’re not really a Ford kind of guy.”

Hannibal couldn’t help a pained expression. “It’s bad enough that I’ll have to sit in a car reeking of wet dog. I’d rather not have muddy pawprints on my lap as well.”

“What makes you think he’ll get on your lap?”

“I assume you intend to drive at least part of the way today.”

“Yeah, of course.” Will turned the dog over to rub at its belly, and it kicked its legs happily. “I can drive now, if you want.”

Hannibal shook his head. “I’ve only been driving for two hours, and you got far less sleep than I did last night. I plan to stop in Medicine Hat to refuel, you can take over then?”

“Whatever you want to do. How are you, by the way?” Will finished towelling off the dog—it was still filthy, but there was nothing more they could do for that until it could be washed—and shoved the towel into the plastic bag Hannibal offered him.

“I’m all right. I slept well last night, and that helped,” Hannibal said, putting the bag in the trunk and closing it. “How’s your shoulder?”

“It didn’t appreciate being used so much last night, but it’s fine. I’m used to having issues with it anyway.” Will let the dog into the backseat and then threw himself into the passenger seat.

Hannibal waited for him to buckle his seatbelt before getting back on the road. “I’ll take a look at it tonight. You’ll likely need physical therapy.”

“I think I know all the exercises by now. This isn’t nearly as bad as the last time.”

“When Chiyoh shot you?”

“Yeah. And I already had trouble with it before that—I got stabbed, back when I was a cop in New Orleans. Same shoulder. So I’m kind of used to being careful with it.”

Hannibal considered pointing out that repeated injuries to the same joint meant a higher risk of long term complications, but he was sure Will already knew that. “I still want to check it.”

“Well, I’m not going to stop you if you want to take my shirt off.”

Hannibal chuckled. “You see right through me.”

“Yep.” Will popped the p loudly, grinning.

Hannibal glanced at him. “I wonder sometimes if you’re irritating on purpose, just to see if I’ll react.”

“Sometimes, yeah. Sometimes I’m just annoying. Either way I like that you let me get away with it. There aren’t many people you let get to you, and fewer of those you haven’t made plans to remove. The fact that you let me poke at you and still want to spend the rest of your life with me is pretty empowering.”

“Apparently, I’m crazy about you,” Hannibal said dryly.

“So I’ve heard.” Will paused. “Molly used to yell at me about getting the dogs muddy too. I mean, we never had a tiny puffball like Az, but big dogs like Becca or Winston are even worse. I had to give them baths outside and then bribe Wally to help me get the mud off the porch.”

“What did you just call Asclepius?”

Will rolled his eyes. “I told you, it’s a ridiculous name. I’m not going to say the whole thing every time I call him—unless you were objecting to the ‘puffball’ part, but that’s pretty hard to deny.”

“You’ve never given me a nickname.”

“You’re not a dog. And I didn’t really think you’d appreciate one. Although, now that you mention it, I’ve been thinking about calling you Hank, considering the false name.”

Hannibal winced. “Please don’t.”

Will grinned. “So you don’t want a nickname, then? What did you think I would call you? Bally?” He laughed. “Sorry, sorry. God, I don’t know how I feel about ‘Henri’, though. And I have to pretend to be able to pronounce _Gagnon_ , too.”

Will’s pronunciation certainly left something to be desired. “Perhaps we’re recently married?”

“That’s even true. What was my maiden name, anyway? Do they still call it that for men?” Will dug in the glovebox until he found the marriage certificate. “Wheatley. Does she think she’s funny?”

“Undoubtedly. And I believe they do, actually—one meaning of the word ‘maiden’ is original. Of course, many homosexual couples choose not to take their partner’s name at all, or hyphenate.”

“I’m glad we didn’t. Wheatley-Gagnon is quite a mouthful, and Gagnon-Wheatley is even worse.”

“Would you have wanted to, in the universe where we got married as Will Graham and Hannibal Lecter?”

Will shrugged. “I don’t know. Lecter-Graham sounds okay, I guess. Depends on whether that’s the same universe we had kids. I think we probably would have each kept our own last names, really. Publications and things, you know.”

“Yes,” Hannibal agreed. “I have always liked the way Abigail Graham sounded.”

Will sucked in a sharp breath. “Don’t.”

“Forgive me.”

Will shook his head. “Sorry, you’re fine. I just...wasn’t expecting that to hurt as much as it did.”

“I should have.”

“I brought it up.”

“That doesn’t excuse me for hurting you. I am trying to be better about that.”

Will gently laid his hand on Hannibal’s thigh. “I’m fine. I was just startled. I’m not upset with you, please don’t shut down and not talk to me for hours because you think I’m pissed off.”

“Do I do that?”

“You have been.”

“I thought you’d appreciate the space.” He supposed he had been backing off, although he wasn’t sure he would characterize it as “shutting down”.

“‘I’d rather have your honesty than your silence.’”

“That implies that my silence is in some way dishonest,” Hannibal pointed out. “Perhaps I simply don’t know what to say.”

“Anyone else could get away with that, but you?” Will shook his head, taking back his hand. “You have things to say. You just think they’ll upset me, so you keep them to yourself. I suppose I appreciate the thought behind that, but if you really trust me, you’ll also trust that I can get upset and we’ll still be okay.”

“You as well, then. You seem convinced that if I get angry everyone in a twenty mile radius will drop dead. I am an adult and I do have control over my actions.” Hannibal’s voice came out sharper than he’d intended.

“Really? You want to go down that road? I know you have control over your actions. Attributing your terrible decision making to emotional fallout is fucking charity. Your idea of a ‘controlled reaction’ is pretty goddamn awful. And you said yourself that you ‘couldn’t promise anything’ about what you’d do if I left. What are you going to do if we get into a real fight? You know I’m going to feel responsible for every person you recklessly kill, and you don’t get why I don’t want you to get mad?”

“It isn’t my fault that you have a savior complex.”

“It _is_ your fault that you think an acceptable reaction to a difficult situation is to murder people until the situation improves,” Will countered. “Okay, so I agree, it’s cathartic. There are a lot of people breathing air who maybe shouldn’t be. But you can’t even argue that you wouldn’t kill anyone if we had a fight! Honestly, at this point I half expect you to throw Asclepius out the window. Or no, sorry, that isn’t your style. I expect to wake up tomorrow morning to his mutilated body staring back at me while you fry up his kidneys. I’m not even that attached. But you’ve taken every other living thing I care about away from me. So I’m fucking sorry if you don’t get why I might be a little hesitant to piss you off.” He sighed in frustration. “You fucking drama queen, Jesus Christ.”

Hannibal took one deep breath, and then another, hands white knuckled on the wheel. Will had been pushing for his anger, and he had it. 

“You can’t even say anything to refute it.”

“I could kill you now. It would be easy. But I won’t. Is that not self control? Is that not me controlling my reaction?”

“That’s self-preservation.”

“I wouldn’t be so self-confident.”

“What else can you do to me? You’ve taken everything, even my _life._ I don’t care if you kill me now. Do it. It’ll save us both a lot of trouble. But if you’re going to keep me alive, if you’re going to _love_ me, then you can’t do this. We are going to argue. I am going to get angry, and so are you, and there is nothing we can do about that other than learn how to deal with it without fucking killing each other.”

“I don’t know how to be other than what I am,” Hannibal said, and his voice came out smaller than he’d intended. 

“I don’t want you to be. I wouldn’t ask you to be.” Will’s voice lowered to match his. “I just...I’m tired of being hurt by you.”

“I don’t want to hurt you anymore.” He spoke softly, voice shaking slightly. “I want you to be happy.” 

“I know,” Will said, the last of the anger draining out of his voice. “And that’s enough. It _is_. But you can’t honestly say you don’t see where I’m coming from.”

Hannibal looked away from him, out at the fields rolling past them. “I am...unaccustomed...to caring for someone the way I do for you. It has been a very long time since anyone had the power to hurt me in the ways that you have.” It wasn’t an apology, but an apology was beyond him. “I hope that, in the future, I will be better prepared for my reactions to your decisions.”

“That’s really all I can ask for.” Will sighed. “I know you want me to be happy. I know that, more than anything, you don’t want me to leave. I’m all for being happy, if such a thing is possible, and I sure as hell don’t want to leave. I don’t exactly like living without you a whole lot better than you like living without me.”

“You don’t seem worried that I might try to leave you.”

“That didn’t go very well the last time you tried it. Plus you did turn yourself in _specifically_ so that I could keep track of you. I think even a person without my deductive skills could figure out that you were pretty committed to this.”

“Abigail’s death was a loss of control.” He hadn’t even known the words were on his tongue before they poured out of his mouth. “I was—I was so angry with you, Will. I had not been that angry in my adult life. It was the only thing I could think to do that might hurt you as much as I had been hurt.”

“But you still couldn’t kill me.”

“Death would have been a mercy, and I was not in a merciful mood.”

“I would have run away with you if I’d known she was still alive,” Will whispered.

“I know,” Hannibal said, grip tightening again on the wheel. “I wanted you to want me enough to come. I couldn’t tell you before we left. You wouldn’t have kept it from the rest of them. Even when I thought you were on my side, I knew that much.”

“Bev found her, didn’t she? That was why she had to die.”

“Yes. That, I would do again. She was a good woman and a good friend to you, but I am not and was not interested in being discovered.”

“I know.” Will’s voice was hard. “I knew then. I was just so desperate for any kind of confirmation—I didn’t thinks she’d be stupid enough to go snooping around your house alone. But that’s what happened, isn’t it? She came to your house, found Abigail, and you killed her.”

“Yes.” The word seemed to ring in the sudden silence of the car. Hannibal glanced at Will and saw him staring out the window, jaw clenched. He tried to think of something else to say, to ease Will’s mind, but there was nothing. Slowly, he loosened his grip on the steering wheel and flexed his fingers, allowing the silence and hoping that Will wouldn’t consider this “shutting down.”

After a few minutes, Will exhaled sharply, resting his forehead against the window as the tension went out of his shoulders. “Okay, so that awkward silence is on me.”

“Understandably so.” Hannibal raised a hand of the wheel in an approximation of a shrug.

“If we weren’t stuck in this car, I would have just left.” Will sat up, rubbing a hand over his face. “I guess the one good thing about being in this tiny box is we don’t have any choice but to work through stuff.”

“The obvious drawback being that there’s no opportunity for healthy retreat and contemplation.”

“You mean sulking and stewing in animosity?” Will smiled, though it wasn’t a very happy expression. “We’ll be off the road soon enough, I guess. I’m sure the house is big enough to give us each our own space, when we need it. You know I’m not very good at being with people constantly, even if it’s just you.”

“I do, though I can’t say the same. I sometimes think if I never left your side I would still not have enough time with you.”

Will inhaled sharply. “God, you can’t just keep saying things like that. Jesus. What am I supposed to do with that?”

“Do you want me to lie to you?”

“No, of course not. I just—Jesus. I’m not used to being—not just wanted, but whatever intense thing that was.”

“It wasn’t my intention to distress you with the intensity of my regard.”

Will made a sceptical noise. “The ‘intensity of your regard’. I guess that’s one way of putting it. And I wouldn’t say I’m distressed, exactly. Just a little overwhelmed. It’s one thing to joke about how crazy for me you are, another entirely for you to remind me that you’re actually, you know, crazy about me.”

“I don’t know how to love you any other way.”

“I certainly don’t want you to. What’s so overwhelming is the idea that you can feel as much for me as I do for you.”

Hannibal turned and looked hard at him. “Do you?”

“Of course I do. What kind of a question is that?”

Hannibal turned his eyes back to the road. “A reasonable one, considering that you are an empath, known for mirroring emotions. And your history of using that skill to manipulate me.”

“As you’ve pointed out several times, there’s no reason for me to be here unless I want to be.” Will sounded defensive. “You’re right, of course, that on some level I probably am mirroring your emotions. But believe me, I have more than enough experience fighting off other people’s desires to know I wouldn’t feel like this if I didn’t feel mostly the same. Also...there’s something different about how you experience emotion that makes you harder for me to read. That’s why it took me so long to realize that you were what you are. Now that we’ve gotten closer, I can read you almost as easily as anyone else, but it feels different? You feel different. There’s you”—he gestured with his hands—“and then over here, separately, is me. Honestly, it’s one of the things I like best about you—you’re the only person I’ve ever known with whom I could be together, and also still _me_. Some bits of me kind of are yours, though, just like some bits of you are mine, of course.” He frowned, making a vague gesture. “I’m not used to explaining this. The other night, right, when I changed the hotel plans and you were so surprised and I told you I wasn’t sure whether I’d thought of it independently or if you had?” He waited for Hannibal’s acknowledging nod. “That’s because, when I relax, other people’s thoughts—or feelings, or whatever it is that I pick up on—sometimes just kind of slip into my head unannounced, especially people I’m close to. And a feeling like exhaustion, from you, is about the same as a feeling of exhaustion from anyone. It’s more of a physical thing than a psychological thing, and so you experience it in much the same way as other people, or as I do. But things like anger or affection are just—different, coming from you, you know? I can feel them as things that are foreign to me.”

“I think I see what you’re trying to say,” Hannibal said. In truth, it was the most coherent explanation of Will’s gift he’d ever heard the man give. Part of him wished he’d recorded it, so he could use it in a paper, but Will would never allow it. His psyche was fascinating. “Thank you for trying to explain.”

“If anyone deserves to know what’s going on in my head, it’s you.” Will shrugged, feigning nonchalance. 

“I appreciate the privilege.”

“It must be hard for you,” Will said. “Being such a controlled, confident person, and then having me come along and upset that so completely.”

“Meeting you was the most disruptive thing to happen to me in a very long time,” Hannibal agreed. “But also the best.”

“When did you realize? That I was going to turn your life on its head.”

“I don’t recall that there was a specific moment. As you said, the connection was there from the moment we met, and you certainly caught my attention immediately. I know that I was in love with you before you were arrested, and I also know that I hadn’t realized it yet. But loving you and being disrupted by you are two separate things. I think I knew you were having more of an effect on me than I’d anticipated when you stopped letting me visit you. Before you sent poor Matthew Brown to kill me, certainly.”

“And loving me?”

Hannibal shrugged. “That I am less certain of. Before you killed Randall Tier, I think, although I didn’t realize the depth of it until I discovered your betrayal.” He paused, thinking. “In retrospect, however, I think that I fell in love with you the moment you shot Garrett Jacob Hobbs.”

“Hell,” Will breathed. “That long?”

“In all honesty, I can hardly recall any time before I felt this way about you. Does that disturb you? When did you begin having feelings for me?”

Will shrugged. “It doesn’t bother me, no. I’m just surprised. As for my feelings, well...they’re maybe a little more complicated than yours. I was pretty attached to you before you got me sent to prison, but when I realized what you were that kind of...changed.” He frowned. “I should have hated you. Some days I thought I did. I wasn’t lying when I said I needed to work out how I felt about you. My emotions about you have been a messy tangle ever since then, honestly. Like the dogs got into the fishing line and turned it into the kind of knot it takes days to undo. I wasn’t certain I loved you more than I hated you until we fell into the Atlantic together.”

“But you are certain of that now?”

“I’m pretty sure I _just_ answered that. At length. But, if you need to hear it again, yes. I love you. I don’t hate you anymore. I just don’t know how much I trust you.”

Hannibal frowned. “Unfortunately, I find myself with similar doubts.”

“We need time,” Will said, fingers spread wide on his knee. “With everything that’s happened between us, I think that’s pretty reasonable. It’s like you’ve been saying this whole trip—we just need to be honest with each other. Eventually we have to hope we’ll get to the point where we don’t have to put so much effort into that.” He paused, glancing at Hannibal and away. “And I don’t just mean not lying and not actively manipulating each other. I mean things like speaking up when something I do is bothering you and letting me know if something isn't working, or if you want something I haven’t been giving you.”

Hannibal sighed. “I will endeavor to do so, provided you do the same.”

“I’ll do my best. I guess, as a caveat to that, we’re also going to have to try to not bite each other’s heads off when we disagree on something, though it’s probably mostly me that needs to remember that. Sorry.”

Hannibal waved a hand at him. “We’ve both been frustrated. I imagine that will continue. You and I are used to having arguments on a much grander scale than the mundanities we face now, which makes us unfortunately ill prepared to handle them.”

“What are you thinking of?”

“You, with the dog earlier. Playing in the mud.”

“I thought you handled that pretty well.”

Hannibal nodded slightly in acknowledgement. “I worry that you might react poorly to a stronger admonishment, and I worry that I might chastise you too harshly for something inconsequential.”

“What do you think I’m going to do? If you tell me to do something I don’t want to do, I’m probably just going to not do it.”

“I—I’m going to say something, or do something, and you’re going to leave me. I don’t know what brought you back to me, but I do know I don’t deserve it. I don’t know how to make you stay.”

Will sighed fondly. “I promise, I’m not going to leave you over something as stupid as giving a dog a bath.”

“But when it’s not that? When it’s something that isn’t ‘stupid’? I don’t know how to do this with honesty.”

“I love you,” Will said, catching Hannibal’s hand and holding it. “You’re worried that will change when I see you without your armor, but it won’t. I want you, the real you. That’s all I’ve ever wanted.”

“How can you know?”

“How do you know you won’t get disillusioned and lose your attachment to me? I feel like after everything we’ve been through, the fact that we’re both still here is a pretty good indicator of the longevity of this.”

“A persistent emotional connection is not necessarily a sufficient base for a lasting relationship.”

“Oh, believe me, I know,” Will said darkly. “But given that our ‘persistent emotional connection’ has made it hell to live without you, I’m thinking it’s not a bad start.”

“Will you tell me when it stops being enough? Before you’ve decided to leave?”

Will’s gaze was like a physical weight. “You really think I’ll leave you, don’t you?”

Hannibal didn’t look at him, nodding slightly. 

“I was hoping last night would help you get over that,” Will said. “But I guess I’ll just have to stay, and hope that someday you accept that that’s not going to change. But yes, I will tell you if something in our relationship needs to change. That’s definitely included in my ‘we need to be honest with each other’ clause.”

“I suppose that will have to be enough. I’m unaccustomed to this level of insecurity.”

“I’m unaccustomed to having to reassure you. I’m afraid ‘being reassuring’ is not one of my strengths.”

“You’ve been doing well so far.” Hannibal finally looked over at him, offering a slight smile. “There aren’t many people who have emotionally manipulated me with any success. Of those who have, you are the only one still alive.”

“Okay, that’s fair. I have definitely manipulated you emotionally, and you have a right to be wary because of it. But, again, my level of emotional manipulation compared to what you’ve done to me? You tried to cut my head open with a bone saw so you could _eat my brain_. And that’s not even—you let me suffer from encephalitis for months! You _killed my doctor_ so I couldn’t be diagnosed! You framed me for murders you committed! All I did was convince you I didn’t want you to go to jail anymore.”

“You seduced me under false pretenses.”

Will took a second, throat working. His voice was hoarse as he said, “The seduction part was real.”

“Was it?”

Will shrugged. “I wanted you, yeah. I wanted to run away with you. I wasn’t intending to actually do so, but the emotions behind the performance were real.”

“I couldn’t be sure. Rationally, your actions suggested that you were at least somewhat affected, but after your dismissal when we escaped from Muskrat Farm...and when you first saw me again and you acted like I was nothing to you. It was easy to convince myself that you had moved on entirely, if you had ever returned my affections at all.”

“I tried to move on. I wanted to move on. But I didn’t—I couldn’t. I saw you and it was like the last four years hadn't happened. And I knew that would be what happened—I knew I couldn't solve the case on my own, and I knew that the moment I let myself reach out to you I was going to fall right back into your orbit. And I did it anyway.”

“You were trying to save lives.”

“Was I?” Will looked up at him. “I’m not even sure. But I’m not really surprised we ended up here.” He smiled. “Well, maybe here, specifically. I don’t think I ever planned to end up driving through the absolute middle of nowhere, Saskatchewan with you or anyone.”

Hannibal let out a surprised laugh. “Nor I. Much less with a filthy pomeranian in the backseat.”

Will shook his head. “The weather isn’t my fault.”

“The dog is.”

“I’m pretty sure I was upfront about dogs and me being a package deal.”

Hannibal smiled. “Yes.”

The dog, as if sensing that it was being discussed, yipped loudly as it scrambled over the console and into Will’s lap. He laughed, surprised and delighted, as the dog licked his hand and allowed him to scratch behind its ears. 

“I guess muddy pawprints were something to worry about after all. Hey, buddy, settle down. There you go.” The dog flopped down in his lap, and Will stroked it. “Guess he’s warming up to me.”

“I’m glad.”

Hannibal drove until they got to Medicine Hat. Will had been mostly quiet, watching the fields roll by and petting the dog, who had fallen asleep in his lap. Hannibal was content with this silence—it didn’t feel tense, or like it couldn’t be broken, just the quiet of two tired people on a long drive. It gave him space to think, to make plans for how their lives might fit together, since it seemed (impossibly) as though that was really what he was going to get. 

He found himself smiling as he thought about the present Will had gotten him that morning, and wondering how often he might expect to get gifts like that in the future. Vancouver was only an hour or so away from their new home; a large enough city that a few extra disappearances would hardly make the news, and they’d both driven further for less. Chiyoh had made a clever choice.

“The Gas City,” Will said, drawing his attention to the sign they were passing. “How appropriate.”

“I suspect they don’t mean gasoline,” Hannibal replied. 

“Probably not. But it’s a little funny, you have to admit.” 

“Do I?” Hannibal couldn’t help a smile from pulling up the corner of his mouth. “There is a certain irony, perhaps.”

“You gonna let me drive after we get gas?”

Hannibal nodded, turning off towards a gas station. “If Asclepius will let you up.”

Will laughed, sounding a little surprised. “He’ll be happy to get out of the car for a minute. I can’t promise he won’t claim your lap once we’re back on the road though.”

Hannibal wrinkled his nose. “At least I’m wearing jeans.”

They got out of the car at the gas station. Hannibal pumped the gas as Will took the dog on a short walk, and then they got back in with Will in the driver's seat. Fortunately for Hannibal, the dog seemed content to curl up in the back for now.

“It’s another, what, three hours?” Will asked as he pulled back onto the road.

“Maybe less, depending on traffic.”

“Hopefully the hotel doesn’t fuck up our reservation again.”

“I feel as though that didn’t turn out too badly for us last time,” Hannibal pointed out.

Will made a noise that was almost a laugh. “How many dogs do you think we can fit in this car?”

“Fair point.” He smiled. “Thank you, again.”

“I enjoyed it. And hey, I got a dog out of it, so there’s not much to thank me for.” Will was nearly smiling.

“Do you think that’s something you might be interested in exploring more in the future?” Hannibal tried to keep his cautious hope out of his voice.

Will shrugged, smile slipping off his face. “If you’re asking me if I want to hunt with you, probably not. If you’re asking me if this was absolutely a one time thing, also probably not. I don’t know. I enjoy it but it’s also...painful. And I worry that I would become reckless.”

Hannibal nodded. “Reasonable. We’ll see how things go. I’ll probably take some time to let us settle before I try anything, regardless.”

“Yeah. It looks like Vancouver is going to be the best bet, doesn’t it? Big city, lots of tourism, too many people crammed on top of each other.”

“So you have been thinking about it?”

“I’ve been contemplating what you’re likely to do. I like to be prepared when I can be.”

“I thought I couldn’t shock you anymore?”

“Because for the most part, I’ll have at least thought of anything you might do.” Will looked over at him, mouth quirked up. “There’s still uncertainty, but I try to examine all the possibilities. Helps me establish _contingencies_. You can’t tell me you don’t do the same.”

Hannibal smiled broadly. “No, I can’t. I’m not surprised you do. You spend a lot of your time looking at what has happened, but looking to the future takes similar skills.”

“The past is certain. Things happened the way they happened and that doesn’t change. The future is a web of intersecting decisions waiting to be made, twisting and spinning away into obscurity. I can know what’s most likely to happen but I can’t ever know what _will_.”

“None of us can.”

 

Calgary was the largest city they’d come to yet, and of course they managed to hit it right at rush hour; they made the outskirts by five, but it was more than half an hour before they made it to their hotel. Fortunately, their room was ready and correct. 

Will took the dog into the bathroom to clean up, and Hannibal looked through the small kitchen, making a mental list of ingredients they needed to acquire. He pulled out his phone to look up a grocery store, and then, remembering their earlier conversation, looked for a nearby jeweller. 

Will came out of the bathroom shirtless, holding Asclepius wrapped in one of the hotel towels. Hannibal took his time appreciating Will’s damp torso, and grinned when he saw Will’s blush. 

“My, uh, shirt got kind of soaked,” he said, setting the dog down on the bed and digging through his suitcase for a replacement.

“I’m hardly complaining,” Hannibal said, walking to him and placing a hand on his bare shoulder. He rubbed his thumb over Will’s collarbone and was gratified when Will shivered.

“I’m not complaining either, but we probably should go out soon if we want to hit a jeweller before they close.”

Hannibal couldn’t contain the surge of pleasure that filled him at hearing that Will too was eager to acquire a ring. He pressed a kiss to Will’s neck and stepped back, letting him dress. “I still want to look at your shoulder.”

“I’ll still let you. But another few hours isn’t going to make it any worse than it already is. How are you feeling, anyway?” Will asked as he did up his buttons.

“Tired but reasonably well. I am eager to put a ring on you, I must admit.”

“Good,” Will said, glancing up at him through his lashes. “I’m looking forward to it.”

 

They ended up finding a jeweller that was both nearby and close to a grocery store; there wasn’t much online about it but the location was convenient and they looked open. It was better than some mass market store, at any rate, and Hannibal reminded himself that whatever ring they picked up would be temporary.

The store was small, with only one employee: a small dark-skinned woman in a headscarf. She had been polishing a pendant when they walked in, but immediately set it back in its cae, looking up at the two of them with a warm smile.

“How can I help the two of you today?” she asked. There was something no-nonsense about her demeanor that Hannibal liked immediately.

“We’re looking for rings,” Hannibal said, reaching out to take Will’s hand. “We married recently in something of a rush, you see.”

Her polite smile warmed. “Weddings are always a happy occasion,” she said, walking over to a case full of rings. “What did you have in mind?”

“We both do a lot of work with our hands,” Will said, surprising Hannibal slightly. He hadn't expected Will to care much about what rings they got. “So something sturdy, that can be taken on and off easily.”

The woman—her name tag said _Iman_ —nodded. “A lot of gentlemen prefer sturdier rings. The issue with gold is that it’s very soft; I have some that you can look at, but I would recommend platinum, or a titanium alloy. What kind of work do you do with your hands?”

Hannibal smiled at her. “I’m something of an amateur sculptor, and my husband is something of an engineer.”

Will shot him an amused look at that, but neither statement was untrue.

Iman just nodded. “You’ll both probably be removing the rings often, then?”

Will nodded. “Can I see that black one?”

She pulled out a matte black band, placing it carefully on the counter. “This one is actually tungsten carbide. It’s the strongest metal we sell, and won’t scratch or need polishing.”

“What do you think?” Will asked, turning the ring over in his hand. 

“For you or for me?”

“Don’t you think it might be nice to match? For now?”

Hannibal found himself nodding. It would be nice to be coordinated, and the ring was distinctive but formal in a way that would suit them both. 

Iman pulled out a ring sizer and measured both of them, then pulled out two of the handsome black ring. “Would you like to wear them out or shall i box them for you?”

Will held out his hand. “We’ll wear them.”

Iman handed them each a ring, but instead of sliding his on, Will reached for Hannibal’s hand.

“May I?” he asked, not waiting for permission before sliding the ring onto Hannibal’s finger. “Perfect.”

Hannibal’s heart was beating hard in his chest. Wordlessly, he reached for Will’s hand, sliding the ring onto the spot where he still had a slight tan line. He pressed a kiss to the ring and smiled.

Will’s eyes glistened as he smiled back. 

 

After paying for the rings they went and got groceries. By the time they returned to the hotel it was too late to make an elaborate dinner, but they were both in a good mood as they ate the simple feast Hannibal prepared. 

“We’re really married, huh?” Will said, staring at the ring on Hannibal’s hand. They’d mostly finished eating, just lingering at the little table.

“We are,” Hannibal agreed. “Rings and all.”

“I feel freer now than I did before we got the rings,” Will said. “Which seems backwards, somehow.”

“There can be a kind of freedom in certainty.”

“I am certainly feeling certain. I feel like there’s a kind of freedom in no longer fighting what’s between us. In accepting this as the inevitable conclusion, at giving up some of the game.”

“There is a freedom in having made a choice, and knowing that no matter what you do from now that choice will remain made.”

“Yeah.” Will smiled, pushing his chair back from the table. “This has been sitting there looming at me for so long. I feel like half the things I’ve done have been just...reactionary, trying to avoid falling back into your orbit.”

Hannibal watched him take his dishes to the sink for a moment before following with his own. “I am grateful that you came back to me.”

Will shrugged, leaning against the counter as Hannibal ran the water to wash the dishes. “I’m not sorry to be here.”

 

After the dishes, Hannibal looked at Will’s shoulder; it was healing, but he needed to be taking better care of it. Massaging the muscle led to other touches, and they went to sleep that night naked and tangled in each other once again.


	5. Day Four (Calgary to BC)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my sincerest apologies for the time this chapter took me to get up!

The final leg of their journey would be the longest yet, so Hannibal woke at six am to Will’s alarm and found himself heaving a sigh.

Will groaned, burying his face in Hannibal’s neck in an attempt to shut out the sound of the alarm. “Sleep,” he said eloquently.

Hannibal reached over him to shut off the alarm. “We have a long way to go today, my love.”

Will sighed dramatically, flopping onto his back. “I’m so tired of driving.”

“Fortunate, then, that we should be arriving at our new home tonight.”

“If only we could have arrived there yesterday.” Will sighed again, and sat up, rubbing at his eyes.

“Once we’re home we can rest as long as you’d like,” Hannibal offered, also sitting.

“I’m holding you to that.” Will yawned. “It would be better if we were going to a place that was already a home, instead of a house we have to make into one.”

“Chiyoh will have made certain that it has some amenities. Beds, and some basic foods at the very least.”

“A bed is just about all I’m going to want.”

 

They got up and went about their morning routine. After breakfast Hannibal packed a lunch and a snack for the road; they wouldn’t be getting in to the house until well after 6 at the earliest. Will took the dog for a walk while Hannibal packed up their food, and when he returned he insisted on carrying everything to the car. Hannibal found he couldn’t complain.

The quiet settled over them as they drove out of Calgary with Hannibal at the wheel. Everything seemed slightly grey even though the sun was out, as if the world hadn’t quite woken up yet, even though it was nearly eight by the time they left and traffic was heavy. Will seemed to have drawn into himself, and Hannibal wasn’t inclined to disturb him.

The Rockies loomed in front of them, growing larger on the horizon as Hannibal drove on. They seemed quite far off until, suddenly, they were not, great walls of rock rising up on either side of the road as their elevation climbed. Will seemed to be watching the forest roll past them, and Hannibal wondered where his thoughts were. He couldn’t ask.

Finally, Will broke the silence with a sigh. “It doesn’t make me homesick, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

Hannibal inclined his head. “Where have you been?”

Will shrugged, sighing again. “I wonder if we always would have ended up here. What the moment was that could have changed our course, if there was one.”

“Here, as in the Canadian Rockies?”

Will laughed. “No, I know that part was variable. But, just. I wonder if we could have gone our separate ways, even at the beginning. Or if the moment we met, we were doomed.”

“Do you consider this ‘doom’?”

Will shrugged again. “I don’t know. Sometimes. It’s cost us an awful lot to end up here and I—well. I suppose I’m wondering if it was worth fighting in the first place. If I ever had a chance. And then, I suppose, if we’d really have been happier that way.”

“Happier without each other?”

“No, no, happier without all—“ he waved his hands—“this, you know? If we could have been happy together without everything we’ve been through. I feel like I would have resented you for forcing me into something I wasn’t ready for, and you would have been bored with how easy I’d turned out to be.”

“You have never been in danger or boring me, Will.”

“I know.” Will sighed again. “I’d like to say there was a moment I could have done something differently and we’d have ended up here easier. With Abigail alive and with us and with less blood. But I’m not sure that moment existed. Maybe it’s all me, really, I don’t know. But I don’t think I could have let myself be happy with you, without everything else.”

Hannibal nodded slowly. “I understand what you mean.” He allowed himself a small sigh. “I suppose that I had to change my expectations as well. What I wanted from you when I first met you and what I want now are hardly the same, and this kind of vulnerability does not come easily to me. I know now that the only way to truly have you is to allow you your freedom, and yet in allowing you your freedom I can’t guarantee that you’ll stay.”

“And you need for me to stay.” Will rested a hand gently on Hannibal’s knee. “I don’t intend to go anywhere.”

“That’s enough, now. It might have been, three years ago. But it certainly wouldn’t have been from the beginning.”

“And three years ago I wasn’t in any kind of state to forgive you. You _had_ just taken a goddamn bone saw to my head.” Will took his hand back, twisting it with the other in his lap.

“I know.” Hannibal gripped the wheel tightly. “I would have regretted it immediately, you know.”

“I do,” Will said, more gently than Hannibal had expected. “I understand why you thought you had to, and I’m here. I’m alive.”

“We’re both alive. And yet, also dead, officially.”

Will let out an exasperated little huff of laughter, and the tension bled out of Hannibal. “It’s true. Maybe that’s for the best, really. Starting over, just the two of us.”

“And Asclepius.”

Will smiled and put his hand back on Hannibal’s leg. “We’re probably going to want to stop somewhere for him before too long. Little dogs have little bladders.”

They were already well up in the mountains, and phone service was nonexistent to look things up with, so when Will spotted a sign for a visitor center they took the turnoff, even though it was on the wrong side of the road.

“It’s really beautiful here,” Will said as they walked the dog by the river there. “I’ve never been to the Rockies before.”

“It is striking,” Hannibal agreed. “This continent has many beauties I have not yet visited.”

Will smiled at him, a tentative, fond thing. “Maybe we’ll get to see some of them together.”

Hannibal reached out and took Will’s hand, the one that wasn’t holding the leash. Will’s smile broadened, and they walked back to the car holding hands.

 

They were both tired, more than tired, in the way that severe injuries, insufficient rest, and long drives make a person. Hannibal had never felt so deeply exhausted in his adult life, and the high altitude made him feel strangely lightheaded. He also felt surprisingly talked out after three days of constant interaction. Will seemed tired of talking as well, choosing instead to watch the scenery roll by outside the window.

It truly was beautiful here, Hannibal thought as they drove across a bridge. A wide canyon with a broad river flowing through it stretched beneath them, and the mountains rose majestically on all sides. He hadn’t known there were places like this here. He’d been to the Alps, of course, and they were beautiful too, but there was something different here. Maybe it was because it hadn’t been expected, or, more likely, because Will was with him. He suspected the entire world would be slightly more beautiful with Will at his side.

They stopped for gas and lunch around noon. Will slid into the driver’s seat when he came back from letting the dog relieve itself, and Hannibal didn’t say anything to stop him. He felt exhausted, deep in his bones, and he wasn’t entirely sure he could have spoken if he’d wanted to.

The dog climbed into his lap and curled up to sleep, and he found himself petting it automatically. It was nice to have a soft, warm creature to pet, and it was nice to have earned the trust of an animal so quickly. He saw Will smiling out of the corner of his eye, but he didn’t look away from the dog.

 

Hannibal woke to the car stopping, and blinked in surprise. He hadn’t realized he’d fallen asleep.

“Sorry,” Will said. “I didn’t mean to wake you. Az needed a stop.”

Hannibal nodded. They seemed to be at a park of some kind, a green space and some restrooms visible out the window. Will got out with the dog and Hannibal watched them as the last tendrils of sleep left him. He got out and went to the restroom, and by the time he came back to the car he felt more like himself, if still tired.

Will glanced over at him as he pulled the car out of the lot. “Should I ask if you’re okay?”  
  


Hannibal shrugged. Speaking was still more difficult than he would have liked, but after taking a sip from his water bottle he managed to say, “I’m just very tired.”

Will nodded. “Me too. We should be about three hours out, if you wanted to go back to sleep.”

Hannibal shook his head. “I should be all right.”

“Usually you’re such a chatterbox, even when I’ve seen you tired before. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Even I occasionally run out of words, Will.” Hannibal sighed, fiddling with his wedding ring. He liked the weight of it on his hand.  “I haven’t been in an ideal headspace today.”

“That’s fair,” Will said, turning back onto the highway. “We don’t have to talk if you’re not up to it. I imagine we’ll both do better when we have a chance to actually rest and not have to be right on top of each other all day.”

“It’s hardly your company that’s bothering me.” Hannibal picked up his water bottle and twisted the cap back and forth. “Although I will admit that being in the car with nothing to occupy myself is not ideal.”

“On the bright side, I’m sure there will be plenty for you to do once we get to the house.”

Hannibal let out a huff of laughter. “I imagine so. More than we can accomplish tonight, I’m sure.”

“Probably. As long as I can have a hot shower, everything else can wait.”

“I’d like to believe you’ll be able to shower without us having to do much.”

“Yeah, but we’ve got to get the kitchen at least vaguely sorted, right? I assume step one is determining what kind of stuff we have in the kitchen and then getting stuff to make dinner and breakfast at the very least.”

Hannibal smiled. “Food is always an important consideration. Speaking of which, are you hungry? I packed sandwiches if we needed something before we got to the house.”

“I’m alright,” Will said, but he smiled. “I might want one when we get closer though. I appreciate the thought. I don’t know that I’ve said, but I appreciate you doing all this cooking. I know you like it, but still. It’s nice.”

“I do enjoy it, and I suppose one could say I take comfort in it. I enjoy cooking with you more than cooking alone.”

Will’s smile grew. “You enjoy doing most things better with me than alone.”

“I won’t deny it.” Hannibal set his hand on Will’s thigh. “You make my world a brighter place.”

“You certainly make my life more interesting.” Will covered Hannibal’s hand with his own.

Hannibal smiled, and then turned his hand to hold Will’s more properly as they drove.

“You know,” he said, a few minutes later. “I really wasn’t certain that you were going to come back to me. I hoped for it, longed for it, but I didn’t always believe it.”

“That’s...gratifying, I suppose,” Will said after a moment. “I certainly didn’t think that I would.”

“Did you really think you could leave? When you thought poor Francis had taken his own life?”

“I don’t know. I wanted to be able to. I really, desperately, didn’t want to end up here, more than anything, and I knew how easy it would be for this to happen.”

“You wanted to avoid it so desperately that you were willing to kill us both.”

Will tugged his hand out of Hannibal’s. His knuckles were white on the wheel. “I did. And yet, here we are.” He laughed bitterly. “It feels so inevitable. I love you, I love you _so much_ , but I hate feeling like I never had a choice.”

Hannibal nodded, folding his hands in his lap. “I don’t know that either of us ever really had a choice. It seems that either we were going to kill each other or love each other.”

“We’ve come close to doing both.” Will sighed. “And we’ve both tried to fight this connection. It hasn’t gone well for either of us, I don’t think. Nor those around us.”

“No.” Hannibal studied Will’s jaw. Will’s eyes were firmly on the road. “This isn’t where I expected my life to go. It isn’t where I would have wanted it to go. If you had told me ten years ago that someday I would meet a man so exceptional that I would turn myself in to the authorities and remain in prison until he freed me, no matter how long that took, I would have thought you were insane and I would have avoided meeting this man at all costs.

“And yet I find I cannot regret this. You have made me feel alive in ways that I never thought I could. You have known me in ways I never expected to be able to be known. I never dreamed that someone could know me as you do and love me fully. I never dreamed that I would want that. But I find, having it, that I would not give it up. I would rather go back to prison. I would rather die. I would rather starve to death than not know what it felt like to have you love me.”

Will swallowed. “That’s...a lot.” He paused for so long Hannibal wasn’t sure he was going to continue. Finally, he said, “I never expected to have someone love me like this either. It’s honestly the most intoxicating feeling I have ever had in my life, to be completely and entirely seen and loved. It’s almost too much. It feels like something that can’t last—but then, it has, for years, and it hasn’t lessened or gone away at all.

“I’ve been away from you for half the time we’ve known each other and I did everything I could think of to carve you out of my heart, and yet I saw you again and it was like coming home.” Will’s voice was raw, like the words were being ripped out of him. “It was like I’d never left. You were there and every carefully constructed wall just crumbled. And I knew it was going to happen. I got your letter and I knew what was going to happen.”

“And yet you came to see me anyway?”

“I couldn’t not. I couldn’t be that close to you and not see you. And I couldn’t solve the case without talking to you. It’s like I can’t _think_ , when I’m not with you. I don’t know where I end and other people begin. Sometimes that’s easier. But I knew I was never going to figure this case out while most of my head and all of my heart were screaming for me to go to you, even though I knew, I _knew_ this was going to happen.”

“I wish that you didn’t feel so guilty for something outside of your control.”

“I wish that this wasn’t outside of my control,” Will said, and then sighed. “I know, I know, love isn’t something anyone controls. But I wish…”

“‘I wish I knew how to quit you’?”

Will laughed, and looked over at him, incredulous. “I can’t believe you’ve seen Brokeback Mountain. Oh my god.” He choked on another laugh. “Yeah, though, that’s more or less what I meant. Sorry, I know that’s not reassuring.”

Hannibal was just glad to have made Will laugh. “Honestly, I understand. It’s a desire I can relate to.”

“I’m done fighting though. I’m so damn tired of all the violence. It hasn’t gotten us anywhere and it won’t get us anywhere but dead and it isn’t worth it. Being with you feels good, you make me feel good and whole and loved, and I am tired of telling myself I’m not allowed to have that.”

“I’m pleased to hear it. I’m curious to see what will happen between us, if we remove the games and the violence,” Hannibal mused. “I can’t imagine myself ever being truly bored in your company.”

“I certainly can’t imagine being bored in yours. I’m sure we’ll still entertain each other. Just because we aren’t trying to manipulate each other doesn’t mean we won’t still have interesting conversations. And I’m sure we’ll find things to do, both together and separately.”

“I look forward to it.”

 

The rest of the drive passed quickly. Hannibal was in a better mood, and they spoke off and on. They pulled out the sandwiches around six. Will ate while driving, holding his sandwich out for Hannibal to hold whenever he needed both hands on the wheel.

The area around them got flatter and more populated as they drove on. Never entirely flat, but the road came thoroughly down out of the mountains. It was lovely, and different than Baltimore had been. Hannibal looked forward to getting to know a new area.

It was just after seven when Will exited the freeway, and they navigated the end of the evening rush as they looked for their new home. It was in an out of the way cul de sac. Will missed the turn the first time, but Hannibal was sure once they grew familiar with it it would be easy enough. It was really less a cul de sac and more a small dead end road. Their house was the only one down it in this direction, and Hannibal appreciated Chiyoh’s foresight.

The house itself was unassuming. It was a bland cream color, with brown trim. Two stories and a single car garage that they did not have an opener for. Will parked the car in the driveway.

Asclepius leapt out of the car, eager to investigate the front yard. It was a fairly large patch of unlandscaped grass, and Hannibal wondered how Will would feel about adding a tree.

Hannibal went to unlock the door as Will managed the dog, and was pleased that it opened smoothly with the key Chiyoh had given them. He stepped inside a two story foyer, with a staircase to his right and an open living room to his left. Ahead was what looked like a hall closet and a hallway leading to the rest of the house.

Stepping in further, he found a half-bath, a good-sized dining room, and a kitchen even larger than the one he’d had in Baltimore. He was investigating the contents of the  walk-in pantry when he heard the front door open again.

“Hannibal?” Will called.

“In the kitchen,” Hannibal said, poking his head out.

Will rolled his eyes, telling Asclepius to stay before coming down the hall to meet him. “Of course you are. Damn, this is huge. Even you don’t need this much kitchen.”

Hannibal smiled. “Chiyoh knows me well.”

“I suppose she would.” Will wandered out of the kitchen, opening a door at the end of the hall that Hannibal hadn’t gotten to. “Oh good, laundry. And hey, a basement.”

Hannibal followed Will to the stairs, which were in the back of the laundry room/mudroom. “An interesting location for a staircase.”

“Not bad for us though, since it’s right by the back door.” The staircase was narrow, with two turns, but it had a railing and good light. “Shall we investigate? I would prefer to walk through the whole house before we get settled in.”

“Me too, definitely,” Will said, starting down the staircase. “I don’t like the idea of going to bed tonight without having made absolutely sure the house is secure. And no one’s lived here for awhile, right? Can you imagine if there were a squatter?”

 

They walked through the house together, opening doors as they went and checking in cupboards. The house was fully furnished, including a pool table and large flat screen TV in the basement, which Will agreed would have to go. They would likely end up renovating the entire basement to better suit their needs. The upstairs was much better; four bedrooms, one of which was furnished as a study, a hall bathroom, and an ensuite in the master bedroom.

“This is entirely too much house for just the two of us,” Will said, coming down from the attic, which was just a large empty space beneath the rafters. “And that’s not even counting the garage.”

“I’m sure we’ll find ways to put it to good use,” Hannibal said. “Especially if neither of us intends to take employment outside the home immediately. We can convert one of the rooms into a music studio for me and another into a workshop for you, perhaps.”

“Our bedroom is literally half the size of the house I had back in Wolf Trap.”

“I’m sure you’ll adjust,” Hannibal said, walking back down the stairs. Asclepius was waiting for them impatiently, head on his paws with a sad expression in his eyes.

“It’s okay buddy, you can explore now,” Will said gently, bending down to pet the dog. “You’re being such a good boy, aren’t you? Yes you are.”

Hannibal felt a swell of affection in his chest as he watched Will sweet talking the dog. They were here, this was their new home, together. Their new life together was about to begin. It still didn’t feel entirely real, but looking at Will like this he was starting to believe it might be.

 

* * *

since I have them and I thought people might be interested, here's the incredibly messy floor plans for the house:

    

(note that the furniture isn't even sort of to scale aside from the beds and the dining room table)


	6. Chapter 6

I was going to do another chapter where they were established at the house but honestly I... am never going to get around to it and am not proud of this story so it is now being orphaned to remove it from my account. Thank you all for reading and supporting this story!!!

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading! Kudos and comments much appreciated <3
> 
> if anyone wants to come find me on tumblr I have a [hannibal sideblog](http://softwillgraham.tumblr.com) where i make a lot of gifs and yell about how much I love Will


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